Senior Spotlight: Pennridge’s Bergey brought his best

Andrew Bergey loved the competition and the thrill of postseason play.
But what made him happiest out there on the court was playing with the other guys in green.
“The best part of volleyball for me by far is the guys on the team,” the Pennridge senior said. “All five of us seniors have been friends since middle school and the rest of the guys I have come to know and love during high school.
“There are all kinds of personalities and of course some friendly banter but we all get along well. The coaches are great too. They have made sure to keep in touch during quarantine just to check in on us and our families.”
The shutdown wiped out Pennridge’s season, as it did all other spring sports, but Bergey and the Rams built something special over the years nevertheless.
“My main goals for this season were to get better and for the team to get back to states like our program has done historically,” Bergey said. “We’ve been in a bit of a slump the past two years and I thought we had a good chance of fixing that this season.”
Bergey was a main reason.
Said coach Dave Childs: “Andrew improved a ton and was one of our best passers.”
Pennridge has had a tremendous tradition on the court, and part of what goes along with that is a certain camaraderie that brings the team closer together.
“Pennridge is definitely a great place to play because of the brotherhood of the team,” Bergey said. “I would also say because of our history.
“Dave was telling me in the offseason about the great Pennridge teams of the past that showed up to state playoff games about a foot shorter on average than most teams and would look out of place, but then they would go in and smoke their opponents because of their technique and determination.”
Bergey has used the down time to work on some projects around the house. He’s getting a 3D printer, so he’s been making numerous models to print when it arrives.
“I haven’t been able to do much volleyball since the shutdown,” he said. “The only thing I did was right at the start of the closures when I took fellow seniors Chris (McKinney), Pat (Mehlbaum), and Tommy (Cassel) up to my family’s cabin in the mountains for a day and a half.
“We played a lot of spikeball and passed around a volleyball for a while.”
Volleyball will still be very much a part of Bergey’s life: next year he hopes to play club for Grove City College.