SuburbanOneSports.com recognizes a male and female featured athlete each week. The awards, sponsored by Univest, are given to seniors of good character who are students in good standing that have made significant contributions to their teams. Selections are based on nominations received from coaches, athletic directors and administrators.
Univest’s SuburbanOneSports.com Featured Female Athlete for week of Oct. 7, 2019
Kate McQuarrie was leveled on the hockey field recently in the kind of nasty collision that – according to coach Heather Whalin – would have had most players up in arms. “Her girl backed into her, turned around and just ran through her,” the Council Rock North field hockey coach said. “I think her goggles hit Kate’s head, and a big knot came out immediately. When she came off the field, she said, ‘Coach, I’m okay’ and she was smiling. I’m like, ‘Kate, get mad one time,’ and she’s like, ‘It’s fine.’” As it turns out, that is vintage Kate McQuarrie. “I’ve never seen her be negative in my life,” Whalin said. “She smiles 24/7. Sometimes I want to kick her in the shins and say, ‘Be mean,’ but it’s not in her wheelhouse. She’s just this positive person who cheers for everyone. Kate is so smart. She got 36 out of 36 on the ACT test – she’s a genius.”
McQuarrie’s resume is undeniably dazzling. She is a member of the Latin Honor Society, National English Honor Society, National Honor Society, Science Honor Society and serves as vice president of Rock South’s Math Honor Society. Five of six classes in each of the last two years are AP classes, and she will graduate from Rock North with more than 250 volunteer hours. Her college list is an impressive one and includes MIT, UCLA and USC with plans to major in astronautical engineering.
There’s much more to McQuarrie than the fact that she’s an excellent student and a mainstay in the defensive backfield for her hockey team. It’s a side that has made her such a beloved captain of the hockey team. “She’s got this quirky thing that I always found cute, and I think everyone loves it,” Whalin said. “She has this pig collection, and she bought one for everyone on the team, and they all have different names. She’s had these pigs her entire life.” Pigs, yes, pigs - TY Beanie Baby pigs that have taken the Rock North hockey team by storm. Three of the team’s corners are even named after McQuarrie’s three pigs – Arnold, Wiggy and Simon. “ The pig connection to the field hockey team began innocently enough after McQuarrie’s sister took some pictures of one of them while on vacation (The pigs travel have visited far more places than most people). “The field hockey team saw the pictures and were like, ‘Those are so cute, you should bring them to practice,’” McQuarrie said. “My coach is so superstitious. I brought them to practice, and we had a good practice. I brought them to the first game and we had a good game. She was like, ‘Those pigs have to be here all the time, they can’t go anywhere.’ They kind of became our new mascot.”
The pigs – who have their own wardrobes and attend every game - wear personalized necklaces made by the players, including a GPOAT (Greatest Pig of All-Time) necklace. They have their own Instagram account (smol_piggy) that includes photos of their adventures. “My sister took them to South Korea - they’re more well-traveled than I am,” McQuarrie said. “I think last year we really needed some motivation in the middle of the season, and I think everyone coming together and having something that was a common thread – we all had a little pig. It just was a little inspiration for us and something that brought us together.”
McQuarrie is heavily involved in community service. Topping her list is the community club called SHARE (Students Helping Area Residents Effectively). She is also a student mentor for the Rock Ambassador program, a freshman mentoring program. She is co-president of the student tutors at Rock North, which matches up students with their past teachers from elementary school to tutor their students for an hour after school. Next year McQuarrie will begin her quest to become an astronautical engineer, an interest that was sparked by her passion for physics and math. “My goal would be to send a pig into space,” she said. “That’s the life goal – to somehow get a job in astronautical engineering and send a pig to space.”
To read McQuarrie’s complete profile, please click on the following link: https://www.suburbanonesports.com/featured-athletes/female/kate-mcquarrie-0087623
Univest’s SuburbanOneSports.com Featured Male Athlete for week of Oct. 7, 2019
Like the William Tennent football program over the past two years, Andrew Forr has undergone a transformation of sorts. The Panthers infamously lost 27 consecutive games from 2015-17, and while Forr was not a part of any of those varsity squads, he was more than familiar with the perennial cloud of losing that had permeated the program. Forr played jayvee as a freshman and sophomore, and those teams never won either. Last season as a junior, Forr, a linebacker who also plays some fullback as well as on special teams, won his first varsity game when Tennent snapped the streak in a victory over Upper Moreland. It was a good start, but like the team, Forr had many miles to go and refused to let himself become satisfied and complacent. He and his teammates loved the feeling of triumph, and to keep that mindset going, Forr refused to rest on his laurels.
The Panthers would win just one more game in 2018, but now are steadily heading in the right direction, Forr and his teammates took it upon themselves to do everything possible to make themselves better along the way. He led the team in tackles and was named third team all-league, but at the same time still had a lot to learn about the game itself. “The biggest strides Drew has made have been in the mental aspect of the game,” said second-year head coach Rich Clemens, who was hired before the 2018 season to help reverse the tradition of losing festering within the program. “Prior to me getting there, he had played in a very different system and was basically starting from ground zero in terms of football IQ. By the end of his junior year he had learned the entire defense. Now, he understands the game to the point where it’s like having another coach out there on the field.”
Forr is your prototypical “work hard, say little” football player, preferring to lead by example and let his actions — and not his mouth — do the talking. He is all business in every aspect of his life, and his no-nonsense approach has paid major dividends. It was the hard work and the bring-your-lunch-pail-and-hard hat mentality, that would allow this former mess of a program to turn a true corner. “I’ve never been the tallest or biggest guy,” Forr said. “But I’ve loved football since I started playing pound-ball at 6 years old. I love the physicality of it and how it takes 11 guys on each side of the ball doing the exact same thing in working together. I came in on the junior to varsity and everybody was like, ‘27 straight losses, that sucks.’ I’ve never been one to sit back and let things happen. I wanted to change it. A lot of my classmates wanted to change it too, so we’ve put in the work ever since. I’d say it’s panned out a little bit the last couple of years.”
Above everything, Forr has been a model of consistency and has never stopped working full throttle, whether in high school football or in life. “It’s what I did because it’s what I had to do,” he said. “It is gratifying to know that my coaches and other people see it, but the real reason I stuck with it is because it’s what needed to be done.” Forr also is a member of the Tennent track and field team, where he mainly throws the javelin, so he still has that to look forward to even after football season ends. And he’s so much more than just an athlete at the school, as Forr works himself as hard in the classroom as he does on the football field. He boasts a 3.5 GPA and is currently enrolled in four AP classes: Microeconomics, Macroeconomics, Biology and Government. Forr said he finds it enriching to learn and take in as much information as he can across a variety of subject matters, and receiving the college credits doesn’t hurt matters either. He hasn’t picked a college yet or settled on a definitive major or career path, though he said he’s pretty sure he will go the business route, be it something involving finance or economics.
To read Forr’s complete profile, please click on the following link: https://www.suburbanonesports.com/featured-athletes/male/andrew-forr-0087625
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