Newsday Athlete of the Week is Roslyn baseball's Lucas Weisser

While Lucas Weisser has been a jack-of-all-trades on the baseball diamond, he’s been acing it in the classroom.

The Roslyn senior will attend The Wharton School, the prestigious business school of the University of Pennsylvania in the fall. Weisser’s parents both attended Penn, where his older brother, Justin, is currently a junior.

Weisser sports a weighted GPA of 105 and he scored a 1,550 on the SAT, which has a maximum score of 1,600. Though he is currently undecided, Weisser said he plans to study finance and may try to join the baseball team as a walk-on.

“Going to Penn is a goal that I’ve had for a while. It was really nice to finally realize it,” Weisser said. “I love playing baseball. It’s my passion. But I also realized that everyone’s baseball journey ends somewhere and that academics are very important, so that’s something I’ve always put a lot of time and effort into.”

Weisser has also covered sports, including basketball and tennis, for Roslyn’s school newspaper, The Hilltop Beacon, since his sophomore year.

“He interviewed me when I was a basketball coach, he’s interviewed the other coaches,” said Roslyn baseball coach Dan Freeman, who was an assistant basketball coach for 10 years. “Everyone he comes in contact with is just impressed by him. He’s very well-liked by teachers and his peers throughout the building.”

Weisser has started on the baseball team since his freshman year, when the Bulldogs won a regular season conference title. Primarily an outfielder, Weisser learned how to pitch as a sophomore to help fill a glaring need.

“I always preach doing whatever is best for the team,” Weisser said. “After that freshman year, we lost basically everyone. We had no pitching left and my coach knew I had a good arm from playing outfield. I took some time and worked on that in the offseason and learned how to pitch at the high school level.”

He struck out five and allowed three hits in six scoreless innings as Roslyn suffered a 3-2 loss on a seventh inning walk-off to Garden City on Thursday. Weisser and Freeman both called it the best game he’s ever pitched. He holds a 1.27 ERA and 10 strikeouts in 11 innings this season.

Weisser has played every position besides catcher in his high school career. This year, he’s played first and second base in addition to pitching. Weisser said he had never played second base until last year, when Freeman needed to fill another hole and asked Weisser if he could play the keystone. Weisser replied, “Yeah, why not?”

While his position may change any given day, Weisser’s bat has been a constant. He’s hitting .500 with a 1.230 OPS, eight RBIs and five runs to start the season. Weisser has a career batting average of .413 with 70 hits and 45 RBIs.

“He’s our best outfielder, but he hasn’t been playing outfield this year because we need him at other positions,” Freeman said. “We’ve made the playoffs each of the three seasons he’s been here and it’s no coincidence that we’ve had success while he’s been here.”