HomeBlocksFront-TopPatience Pays Off for SMHS Grad Weirick

Patience Pays Off for SMHS Grad Weirick

San Marino High School entered the 2020 boys’ volleyball season with justifiably high hopes, with clutch performers at key positions and many had included the Titans in discussions about winning a Rio Hondo League championship following a lengthy absence.

One of those promising players was then-senior outside hitter Carver Weirick, who had to endure the interminable “will-we-play-or-won’t-we-play” drama that followed.

It’s an ongoing debate that probably will only reach a conclusion when and if the pandemic ends: Which athletic team was most negatively affected by COVID-19?

At San Marino High School, boys’ volleyball probably has the upper hand. The Titans were about to begin their first game of the season on March 12, 2020, when the season was unceremoniously scrubbed on account of the then-mysterious outbreak. Due to it being an indoor sport, volleyball was canceled and when the California Interscholastic Federation restarted sports a year later, the governing body of high school athletics made special accommodations to assure that the sport received first dibs.

As all are now aware, “won’t” won, but Weirick quickly pulled himself together after graduation and took his talents to Hoboken, New Jersey, where he enrolled in the Stevens Institute of Technology. Weirick had a standing invitation from head coach Dan Buehring to play for the Ducks, which he immediately cashed in. And while he may have missed that opportunity to win a Rio Hondo League championship at SMHS, Weirick almost fried a much bigger fish this past May when Stevens advanced all the way to the NCAA Division 3 semifinals.

The Ducks amassed a 30-4 record with Weirick playing a significant role. He played 63 sets in the 30 games in which he appeared at the libero position, a designated defensive specialist who has limited offensive capabilities. Weirick collected 91 digs over the course of the season and hopes to move back to the outside hitter position he held at San Marino High School and during his time in club volleyball.

Meanwhile, the 2020 SMHS graduate is majoring in mechanical engineering with a concentration in aerospace engineering at the prestigious university. Weirick is involved in an accelerated master’s program that allows him to concurrently work on his undergrad and graduate studies, which he hopes to complete in robotics or space systems.

He has impressed Buehring with his knowledge of volleyball. 

“Carver has been an incredibly steady, positive and diverse contributor on our team ever since I arrived his first year at Stevens,” Buehring said. “Carver’s ball control, volleyball IQ and high-energy personality has been a blast to work with. Our entire program – coaching staff and his teammates – find him to be warm, funny, hard-working and just a great person to be with. We look forward to three more years with Carver and can’t wait to see what he does in the time he has remaining here at Stevens.”

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