The philosopher Aristotle wrote, “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act, but a habit.”
Excellence or success is not just an achievement; it is what a person does each day. Therefore, a person’s work ethic, their approach to achieve their goals, must be excellent. To be successful one must be diligent, pursuing their goals daily. If greatness was easy or just by chance than it wouldn’t be greatness at all.
Hannah Veith, a senior volleyball player at Robert Morris, has worked diligently in pursuing her goals.
“Success to me is understanding your potential and doing everything you can to achieve that,” said Veith. Well, through her tireless work ethic she has done just that.
She has won back-to-back First Team All-NEC awards over the last two seasons. She led the NEC in hitting percentage with .377 and her percentage increased to .447 in conference play. She has recorded twenty double-digit kill matches, won the “NEC Player of the Week” award numerous times, and she was selected the CVU.com National Player of Week.
The accomplishments continue. She is one of the most accomplished volleyball players in school history. She ranks third in blocks with 421, eighth in kills with 1,041 and second in hitting percentage with a .354 average. Also, she is only one of three players to ever record 1000 kills and 400 blocks.
It is obvious to see that she has been successful on the court, but it does not stop there.
“Hannah is one of the hardest working student-athletes I have had the pleasure of coaching,” said women’s volleyball head coach, Dale Starr. “She is also the definition of a student-athlete and works as hard in the classroom as she does on the court.”
Veith is a dual major in Business Management and Marketing. She is also an honor student and has been on the dean’s list every semester so far of her college career. Veith is also a member of the Colonial Leadership Academy, has interned at Time Warner Cable and has volunteered at the Pittsburgh Food Bank.
Achieving all of this is not easy. “There are things that I have to give up that most ‘normal’ college students get to do,” said Veith. But she says doing what she loves makes all the work worth it.
Even with all of this success, Veith remains humble. Playing in a sport that doesn’t get that much attention, apart from her height, she may not even be recognized by many people on campus, but that does not bother her at all. She is unselfish and puts others before herself.
When asked what was the most rewarding part of her career she did not talk about herself or accomplishments, but instead she talked about her teammates. “Honestly the most rewarding part of my career has been getting to know people on my team,” explained Veith. “I won’t be playing volleyball forever but the friendships I made over the past four years are lasting.”
The women’s volleyball team just lost to Long Island in the NEC Conference Tournament on Saturday ending their season. This is not just the end of the season; this is the end of Veith’s career, but this isn’t the end for her. With her success in the classroom, leadership qualities, experience and humility this is just the beginning.
