Volleyball
Favorite athlete: Kendall White
Favorite team: Villanova basketball
Favorite memory competing in sports: Winning the SOL junior year after going undefeated in the league
Most embarrassing/funniest thing that has happened while competing in sports: I tripped over my own foot in the middle of serving and no one in the gym knew what happened—they just saw me start laughing to myself after completely messing up my serve
Music on playlist: Usually pretty chill music but there’s a wide range
Future plans: Major in biochemistry and go into pediatric medicine
Words to live by: “Someone’s life is better with you in it”
One goal before turning 30: Graduate medical school
One thing people don’t know about me: I wear the number 3 because my birthday is 3/3/03 so it’s always been my lucky number
By Craig Ostroff
Carissa Van Veen knew this was going to be a far different volleyball season than she had experienced thus far in her high school career.
When Pennsbury’s senior setter first stepped onto the varsity court as a sophomore, the Falcons were a young but experienced, top-tier squad with no seniors on their roster that battled for the National Conference crown. The following year, Pennsbury came back and dominated to the tune of an undefeated 18-0 league season, conference championship, and an appearance in the state quarterfinals.
With nine players lost to graduation or not returning, this year’s team would look decidedly different. The 2020 squad would have only four seniors and only two with significant varsity experience.
Having a veteran setter would be a key if the Falcons were to achieve any kind of success this season.
“It was huge that we had Carissa coming back,” said Falcons’ coach Tim Paulson. “She has that experience, that work ethic, the understanding of what it takes to win. Aside from Carissa and Izzy (Marinelli), we have a very young team as far as varsity experience goes. Carissa is invaluable. She has that incredible work ethic, and she’s a role model as a player and a teammate.”
Van Veen understood and accepted that her final campaign for the Falcons would likely be one of rebuilding and laying the groundwork for the future.
“I knew this season would be completely different,” she said. “Having lost so many people from last year, coming in this year with very few people with experience, I was already looking to this year as a growth year for this program. It definitely was not what I was used to.”
And that was before Covid threw everything—the season, the school year, life—into chaos.
“The waiting and the uncertainty was really difficult,” she said. “A lot of emphasis was on how to run school, so sports understandably was kind of an afterthought in planning. So we had to wait longer and started the season a couple weeks later than normally.
“It was very different. Tryouts had to be separated, there were early games with no parents there and a silent gym, with subs waiting in the hallway. It’s been very different, but for me, I’m enjoying every moment. I get to play the game I love, I get to have a senior season, which I’ve been looking forward to for so many years, and whatever that looks like, I’m going to do my best to help my team and enjoy our time together.”
Van Veen’s leadership has been crucial, especially because the chances for this young team to bond outside of games or practices have been all but eliminated.
“It’s definitely made things more difficult,” Van Veen said. “Those out-of-practice bonding experiences would be how we get to know the underclassmen, so we’re just making sure we’re making that effort to get to know them, to keep things positive, and to make sure they know they’re an important part of this team.”
On the court, Van Veen provides a steadying presence and, importantly, allows the team to switch from the two-setter format it’s used in the past to a single-setter lineup. It means more responsibility and more work for Van Veen, but that’s a responsibility she is happy to take on. And it’s worked out well for the Falcons, who sit in third place in the National Conference.
“We’d have a big hole in an important position if we didn’t have someone with the experience and ability that Carissa does,” Paulson said. “It’s allowed the younger kids to grow into their roles, and it’s allowed us to go from a 6-2 to a 5-1 this year. She is the setter the whole time, and she’s grown into that role and is ready and eager to take it on.
“The setter in general - and Carissa for us, they’re the glue, they’re part of every rally, they make it easier for other players to look better. With a young team, we don’t always have great ball control, but Carissa is always out there running all over the place, bettering the ball every time. Because we’re young, she’s not always getting the best things to work with, but she’s always making it better for the next girl, and it’s huge to have that.”
More pressure? More work? Maybe. Van Veen simply sees it as getting more time to play the game she loves.
“I honestly think I felt more pressure in the past, when we had the undefeated team and teams with these huge expectations,” Van Veen said. “This season, I get twice as much time on the court. I really enjoy it because I have to be so involved in the game. When you’re running a 5-1, I get to play even more and be more involved.”
Her senior season is the culmination of a long journey that began with Van Veen getting involved with volleyball thanks to a family connection.
“When I was in middle school, I had cousins who played volleyball and my uncle coached them,” she said. “When we would go and visit them, we would spend hours playing.”
And as the appeal of basketball and track faded as high school approached, Van Veen focused her efforts on volleyball.
That doesn’t mean it was easy sailing. On the contrary, Van Veen hadn’t had much experience as a setter before being slotted at setter as a sophomore on an experienced, upper-echelon varsity squad. It was intimidating, but Van Veen’s natural skill and an unmatched work ethic made her into the elite setter she has become.
“I kind of got thrown into setter as a sophomore because there were no other setters,” she said. “I had to go onto this great team, with a lot of experienced girls, and there’s me with no varsity experience. I lacked some self-confidence that first year, but I’ve always been very self-motivated. I put my all into wherever they decide to put me, I hustle every play, and I developed the skills I needed to develop over the years.
“But being on such a strong team as a sophomore and junior, I gained experience and got the chance to play in so many high-pressure situations, it forced me to build confidence in myself and my skills.”
But if Van Veen is putting so much effort, heart, and energy into volleyball, she must be taking it easy in other aspects of her life, right?
Not exactly. In fact, Van Veen’s courseload is her most difficult in all her years of high school. She’s taking three AP classes this semester, and two AP and one Honors course next semester, all while navigating remote learning.
“I know some people try to take it easy their senior year,” she said. “Why would you do that to yourself? Besides, I’m taking classes I’m genuinely interested in.
“School from home was difficult at first, mainly because of technology issues. Now, I’m kind of used to it. I do miss being in classes with my friends. I miss the social aspect of it. I do miss in-person labs and getting to know my teachers. And being at home can be difficult, not because of any distractions, but the monotony of my day. I sit at my desk for 5 hours, go to volleyball, then come back to my desk and do homework.”
Of course, to help break up that monotony, Van Veen sprinkles in a heaping amount of extracurricular activities. This will be her fourth year as a committee member and second year as the Overall Chairperson of the Pennsbury High School Mini-THON, an 8-hour dance marathon in collaboration with Four Diamonds to raise money for childhood cancer treatment, research, and support.
This year, in addition to planning the event, fundraisers, sponsorship, and recruitment, THON leadership is also tasked with trying to establish alternative plans should the pandemic make a regular THON impossible.
“We normally hold it in February, around the time when Penn State it doing their THON; we’re moving ours to spring so that if worse comes to worst, we can hold it outside, and if we can’t do that, we have some ideas about how to do it virtually,” Van Veen said. “Our motto this year is, ‘Cancer Doesn’t Stop for Covid.’ Covid has been terrible for us, but it’s been worse for so many people, including kids, so we’re going to anything we can to raise money and have events.”
Van Veen also serves as Secretary on the Student Council and is a member of Best Buddies, a club she holds close to her heart.
“My Buddy Jess, I’ve known since sixth grade,” Van Veen said. “She has Down’s syndrome. She was in my homeroom in sixth grade and we became friends. We were friends through middle school, but I didn’t see her in high school. I volunteered for Special Olympics my sophomore year and saw her and her mom said I should get paired with her. We fell out of touch for a while, and now to be able to spend time with her and reconnect and be her Buddy is really great.”
All those commitments can make for stressful days and weeks, but Van Veen wouldn’t want it any other way. In fact, she’s not sure she can remember a time when she wasn’t involved with multiple activities, groups, and sports.
“My schedule has been busy since elementary school,” she said with a laugh. “I always wanted to be involved in as much as I could—band, Girl Scouts, sports, fundraising—since elementary school I just tried to get involved in as much as I could. I don’t have a lot of down time, but that’s how I want to spend my time.”
Her schedule won’t get any easier next year. Van Veen is in the process of applying to numerous colleges with a plan of pursuing a career in pediatrics. While she’d plans to continue playing volleyball in some capacity, there are a lot of variables that will determine at which level she can participate.
“That all depends on what school I end up going to, if I play club volleyball or maybe try to walk-on somewhere,” Van Veen said. “It’s going to depend on my courseload, too, but I want to continue playing in some way.”
And if these are the last few varsity volleyball games that she ever plays, Van Veen is satisfied with her career. And no matter where this season takes the Falcons in terms of wins and losses, she’s grateful to have even had the experience.
“I think most of what’s made this season so special is that our team has been so close,” she said. “Getting to spend as long as I can with my teammates and enjoying their company, however long that would possibly go, would make this season the best it could be.
“I’m really happy with what we accomplished in my time on varsity. I’ve had the great experience of playing in the state quarterfinals and winning SOLs—we had our year last year. I have a bunch of friends on Council Rock North and it’s their turn this year. I’m happy for them to get to have the success we’ve experienced. And I’m happy to do what I have to do in my senior year so that our younger girls can have that same kind of success in the future.”
Wherever she may end up, there’s little doubt as to what the Falcon volleyball team, and Pennsbury High School, loses when Van Veen takes the next step on her academic journey.
“I’ve known Carissa for four years now, and I’ve coached her for three,” Paulson said. “She’s been such a pleasure to work with. She’s hard-working, polite, helpful, considerate—she’s a wonderful young lady. We don’t have anybody better as a role model to look up to, not only in terms of her work ethic but all of the other activities she’s involved in.
“She might fly under the radar in the league. She might not be looked at by people outside the program as one of the top players returning in the league, but as far as who makes Pennsbury happen—both in volleyball and all the other extracurriculars she’s involved in—Carissa is the one who makes us go.”
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