Plumbers in Wando, SC

Wednesday, Feb 14, 2024

Avery Warden commands the offense for Warriors win

Wednesday, Feb 14, 2024

Basketball Game Preview: Wando Warriors vs. Ashley Ridge Swamp Foxes

Tuesday, Feb 13, 2024

Stats have been entered for the Wando vs. Conway on Tuesday, Feb. 13, 2024.

Tuesday, Feb 13, 2024

On Tuesday, Feb 13, 2024, the Wando Varsity Girls Basketball team won their SCHSLAAAAA PLAYOFFS ROUND 1 game against Conway High School by a score of 56-34.

Thursday, Feb 8, 2024

Mya Andrus Game Report

Thursday, Feb 8, 2024

Wando skates past Stratford with ease

Tuesday, Feb 6, 2024

Basketball Recap: Isabel Waite leads a balanced attack to beat Goose Creek

Saturday, Feb 3, 2024

Basketball Recap: Wando's loss ends three-game winning streak at home

Friday, Feb 2, 2024

Stats have been entered for the Wando vs. Goose Creek on Friday, Feb. 2, 2024.

Friday, Feb 2, 2024

On Friday, Feb 2, 2024, the Wando Varsity Girls Basketball team won their game against Goose Creek High School by a score of 56-54.

Tuesday, Jan 30, 2024

Stats have been entered for the Wando vs. Stratford on Tuesday, Jan. 30, 2024.

Tuesday, Jan 30, 2024

On Tuesday, Jan 30, 2024, the Wando Varsity Girls Basketball team won their Stratford High School game against Stratford High School by a score of 64-32.

Friday, Jan 26, 2024

Wando skates past Cane Bay with ease

Friday, Jan 26, 2024

Stats have been entered for the Wando vs. Berkeley on Friday, Jan. 26, 2024.

Friday, Jan 26, 2024

On Friday, Jan 26, 2024, the Wando Varsity Girls Basketball team lost their Wando HS game against Berkeley High School by a score of 41-56.

Thursday, Jan 25, 2024

Basketball Game Preview: Wando Warriors vs. Berkeley Stags

Tuesday, Jan 23, 2024

Stats have been entered for the Wando vs. Cane Bay on Tuesday, Jan. 23, 2024.

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Schedule at a Glance

Sat, 2/3W 56-54Wed, 2/14vs ConwayW 56-34Sat, 2/17@ Ashley RidgeL 44-81

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Wando High School 1000 Warrior Way # 1Mt. Pleasant, SC 29466

The Wando High School wrestling team finished 16th at the AAAAA South Carolina State Wrestling Championships on Feb. 24 and 25. One Warrior came home as an individual state champion and another a runner-up in their respective weight classes.

Senior Pierce Carpenter-Kydd finished the season as the state champion in the 170-pound weight class. Coach Adam Schneider said Carpenter-Kydd “put in the work” in the off-season. The senior placed third in last year’s tournament and was determined to place first in his final team season.

“He's not a kid that's coming in to fool around. He comes in and has his fun but when it's time to practice and it’s time to work, he's one of the hardest workers we have,” Schneider said. “He was a little down last year after taking third. Obviously was happy with taking third, but his goal was really to be state champion and you can really see the offseason work that he put in.”

The tournament was also the first official girl’s state championship. Wando has five girls on the varsity wrestling team, three of whom qualified for state. They could choose to wrestle in the AAAAA boys' division or participate in the girl’s tournament, which included teams from all schools, regardless of class. All chose to wrestle in the girl’s bracket, making sophomore Cassidy Warren Wando’s first wrestler to place in the girl’s tournament.

Warren, who is also a cheerleader in the fall, placed second in the 120-pound weight class. Schneider said he immediately noticed her tenacity when she joined the team this winter.

“I think from day one what I realized is how tough she is. Obviously, she's a very good athlete. She's a cheerleader, but she's very tough. It's not one of those sports where, you know, you can go out there and kind of walk through practice. You kind of have to fully immerse yourself and give it your all and she never complained. She wrestled with the guys, with the girls. It didn't really matter who it was,” Schneider said.

The Wando Warriors made it to the Sweet 16 in the tournament, ending a tough season marked by injury and the loss of some of their starting wrestlers.

“We had a couple of starters that did not come out to us and that were kind of expected to come back out this year,” Schneider said. “We had some kids really step up which was outstanding, even through some of the injuries. We had some very good wrestlers kind of get banged up this year, get hurt, so a couple of them didn't get to finish their senior seasons, which is a bummer.”

Though the tournament signaled the end of the varsity season, individual and club wrestling continues year round. Carpenter-Kydd and senior Jacob Pelbath were selected to compete in the 2023 SC North/South All-Star Wrestling Classic on March 3 and 4. Schneider was also named a coach of the 5A/1A-2A South All-Star team.

As a high school principal, I am always interested in where our graduates go in life and what careers they chose. I had the opportunity recently to follow up on three outstanding Wando graduates, the Voit brothers. All three accepted full scholarships after high school at the University of Texas as McDermott Scholars. Walter and Richard were valedictorians at Wando, and Benedict graduated second in his class. These incredible young men are the sons of Dr. Eberhardt and Ann Voit.

Walter will finish his Ph.D. at Georgia Tech this year. He is in the Material Science Department and is working with memory shape polymers, which is a plastic that becomes soft and malleable when heated and holds its new shape when cold. If, however, it gets heated again, it will return to its original shape. This process is not a new one, but he has developed certain new techniques to make the plastic become soft at any temperature he wants to set by changing the properties of the plastic. He incorporated his first company in December of 2007: Syzygy Memory Plastics, Inc. The company has found industrial uses for his processes, and he hopes to begin small scale production this summer in applications, from hearing devices to orthopedics to dentistry. He has four papers submitted for publication and is in the process of applying for patents for his new techniques.

Richard is in his third year of an eight year M.D./Ph.D. program at Southwestern Medical in Dallas. He completed the first two years as any M.D. student would, passed the first qualifying exam and is now doing lab work for the Ph.D. part, looking at zinc-finger nuclease proteins, which can be used to manipulate a cellís DNA in search of a cure for diseases like sickle cell anemia, hemophilia, AIDS and some blood cancers. When he finishes his dissertation, he will then go back to the medical school part and do rotations as the M.D. students would in year three and four.

At the end of year eight, he will be awarded both the M.D. and the Ph.D. together. Then he has to do a post-doctoral work in scientific research and a residency before both the medical field and the scientific field will accept him as one of their own. He hopes to stay in cancer research and run a lab.

Benedict graduated, as did both Walter and Richard, from UT Dallas. Walter got a B.S. and an M.S. in computer science; Richard got a B.S. in Microbiology, and Benedict received a B.A. in Political Science. Benedict started out in computers and actually worked at the National Labs in Los Alamos after his freshman year, converting old computer code to C++ in the astrophysics lab and then analyzing the data and publishing a paper about modeling supernova explosions used to predict star age and behavior, but he said he couldnít envision a lifetime of that, so switched majors his junior year.

He likes Political Science a lot and again published a paper on the long-wave theory in American Politics and presented a paper at a conference in Las Vegas. He now intends to go and get an MBA in a couple of years after gaining work experience. He is working at a firm in Dallas that does modeling and forecasting for Credit Unions on their investment strategies. He is learning the ropes in economics through the detailed work from the bottom up.

The McDermott scholarship program gave all three boys fantastic opportunities to do exciting summer travel and internships, which has had a lot to do with their choices. Walter spent two summers at the National Labs in Los Alamos, Richard and Benedict both one each. The McDermott scholarship paid for an 8-month study in Germany for Walter at the University of Cologne, a 12-week language study program for Richard in China and a 12-week study summer for Benedict in Frankfurt at the Goethe Institute.

Benedict also had a summer internship at the Dallas Federal Reserve in their cash department. The program has sent the scholars as a class to London, Washington D.C., Guanajuato, Mexico, NYC, and given them tickets to the Dallas Opera, the Dallas Symphony, and free passes to all of the Dallas museums. The McDermott Scholar program also encouraged them to volunteer in local elementary schools where 65% of the parents donít speak English.

Although I would certainly credit the parents for raising such talented, creative sons, Ann Voit shared these comments with me about the education her children received in the public schools of Mount Pleasant.

Ann said, ìWhile the boys are doing well and have made good choices, it hasnít been without encouragement of teachers and programs all along the way. When they were at James B. Elementary, it was a magical and wonderfully challenging atmosphere. Trish Yandle turned Moultrie around just as Walter was starting 6th grade, and then you came in Walterís sophomore year at Wando to start the amazing transformation there. They truly have been blessed by a system that has worked. They may not be able to recognize it yet, but once they see the bigger picture of education that isnít directly related to their own endeavors, they will begin to recognize what I already see.

There is no way, ever, for us to be able to thank all adequately for their help in shaping the boys lives, so my only hope is the boys will be able to give to the next generation what has been so freely endowed to them.î

The Voit success story is representative of many of our graduates who are now engaged in challenging careers and impacting the lives of others in positive ways.

I am personally proud of every one of them and delight in hearing their stories and accomplishments.

Three of the top high school athletic programs in South Carolina are located in the Charleston area.

The S.C. Athletic Administrators Association recently announced the winners of the Carlisle Cup in each of the state’s five High School League classifications. The Carlisle Cup recognizes the top athletic programs each year, based on state championships and playoff success.

Prep Zone

Wando is the Class AAAAA winner for the 2020-21 school year. The athletic program captured state titles in volleyball, girls swimming and girls soccer, and was the state runner-up in boys swimming, boys tennis and girls lacrosse. Wando also was Lower State runner-up in girls basketball and girls tennis, third in girls track and fourth in boys track.

Bishop England was the top program in Class AAA this year. The Bishops won state titles in girls tennis, boys cross country, girls lacrosse and boys lacrosse, and were state runners-up in girls basketball, boys golf and boys swimming. The girls cross country team finished third in the state meet, and the girls golf team was third in the AAA state tournament.

Philip Simmons earned the award for Class AA. The four-year-old Berkeley County school won state titles in boys tennis, boys track and girls track, while finishing second in boys cross country and girls cross country. The girls tennis team was AA state runner-up as well. The volleyball and girls basketball teams reached the AA Lower State finals.

High school coaches on the move

Summer is often the time for movement among the prep coaching ranks, and this summer is no different.

Oceanside Collegiate recently announced the hiring of two new varsity head coaches, while an assistant at Berkeley has landed his first head coaching gig.

OCA filled openings in baseball and softball in recent days. Alecia Robinson will assume duties as the head softball coach next spring. Robinson comes to Oceanside Collegiate from Blue Ridge High School in Greer. Robinson served at Blue Ridge for the last three seasons, guiding the Tigers to an undefeated region record and a Lower State appearance in Class AAAA.

Robinson is a former two-time all-state performer at Tuscola High School in Waynesville, North Carolina, where she holds the school’s career home run record.

Richie McCullough will take the reins of the successful baseball program. McCullough replaces Jerry Stoots, who was not retained after the 2021 season. McCullough has been an assistant on the varsity team for the last two seasons. Oceanside played for the Class AA state title in 2019 and won 20 games this spring but failed to make the state playoffs.

McCullough is a native of Columbia and a 1990 graduate of Columbia High. He was a four-year all-region selection who was also was named all-state and played in the North-South all-star game.

Prior to his move to Charleston, McCullough spent 11 years as an assistant coach in Lexington.

Sports

“I am very appreciative for the opportunity here at Oceanside and would like to thank Mrs. (Brenda) Corley and Coach (Mark) Meyer for putting their trust in me," McCullough said. "I love everything about this school.”

Zach Jacobs, who was Berkeley's junior varsity baseball coach and an assistant coach for the varsity team, was hired as the varsity head coach at Beaufort High School. Jacobs is a graduate of Berkeley and was an All-Lowcountry selection as a player. He inherits a program that played for the Class AAAA Lower State championship this past spring. The Eagles lost to James Island in the best-of-three Lower State series.

MOUNT PLEASANT, SC (WCIV) — The S.C. Dept. of Transportation plans to shut down both sides of the Wando Bridge twice in the coming months, meaning a reinstatement of controversial lane reversals on Interstate 526 while repair crews work on the maligned James B. Edwards Bridge.

Kevin Turner, an S.C. DOT engineer overseeing the I-526 Wando Bridge repair project, confirmed the lane reversal plans to ABC News 4 on Thursday. Repair work on the east and west side of the bridge is set to start "sooner than later," he says.

Fortunately, traffic impacts shouldn't be as significant for daily commuters. Turner says the lane reversals only will occur on two single weekends.

On both weekends, Turner says the lane reversals will start after evening rush hour on Fridays, and end on Sundays. The exact weekends for the closures haven't yet been determined, says Turner.

The lane reversals won't be the only impacts of the Wando Bridge repair work.

(MORE | SCDOT following 14 recommendations to improve Wando Bridge)

Turner says there will be an additional four weekends during which individual lanes on both the eastbound and westbound sides of the Wando Bridge will be closed for ongoing repair work.

Also, the trucking lanes on the east and west sides of the bridge, which are currently closed, will remain closed through the duration of the repair work, according to Turner.

Concrete barriers will be added along the closed trucking lanes to enforce the closure and protect workers, Turner says.

Freyssinet USA has been selected through a bidding process as the contractor to handle the $4 million repair. Turner says the construction company is one of a handful in the world qualified to take on the project, as their engineers specialize in post-tensioned box girder bridges such as the Wando Bridge.

The $4 million project will be paid for using a combination of state and federal dollars, Turner says.

Repair work is expected to start this summer, and continue through the first quarter of 2020. An exact timetable has not yet been established.

Turner says local mayors will be the first to know of the timetable for the lane closures and construction developments overall.

Repairs will be made to both the eastbound and westbound sides of the bridge, with contractors working to implement 9 of 14 repair and improvement recommendations made in a January 2019 comprehensive report on the bridge's issues.

The bulk of the work will be repairing corrosion damage caused by water leakage, and improving the structure to prevent water-related damage in the future, Turner says.

On May 14, 2018, DOT officials closed the westbound side of the James B. Edwards Bridge after discovering extensive corrosion and degradation to key parts of the bridge caused by water leakage.

The westbound side of the bridge was deemed unsafe for travel, while the eastbound portion — while in need of repair — was determined to be safe for continued use.

Initially, eastbound I-526 traffic was allowed to continue as normal, while westbound traffic was detoured onto U.S. Hwy. 17 over the Ravenel Bridge.

After nearly a week of extensive traffic congestion in the Mount Pleasant area because of the bridge closure, the DOT elected to reverse one lane on I-526, installing paved crossovers on the Mount Pleasant and Daniel Island approaches to the bridge, and placing dividing cones over the bridge.

The reversal allowed one lane of westbound I-526 traffic from Mount Pleasant to flow across the east side of the Wando Bridge toward Daniel Island and North Charleston.

DOT plans to enact a similar traffic pattern with the impending lane reversals, Turner says, but this time both sides of the bridge will close for a weekend apiece.

That will mean westbound traffic being diverted again into eastbound lanes over the bridge, and vice versa.

When the lane reversal was put in place last May, the move was appreciated by drivers and elected leaders East of the Cooper in 2018, but was criticized by drivers who commute to Daniel Island and Mount Pleasant from West Ashley, North Charleston, Summerville, Goose Creek and beyond.

North Charleston Mayor Keith Summey was vocal in his disapproval, feeling the lane reversals failed to consider the broader impact on traffic in the greater Charleston area.

Turner says DOT this time around has been in frequent contact with Mayor Summey, Mayor Will Haynie of Mount Pleasant, the Port of Charleston, and other local stakeholders, letting them know the potential impacts well in advance.

"We have been apprised of the timing and the plans," Haynie said in response to Thursday's news. "The object is to get complete the repairs we all so painfully became aware of last year, and we are glad to see them occurring."

"I also support the weekend lane reversals because it lessens the impact on the tens of thousands of Mt. Pleasant residents who commute on workdays," Haynie added.

Mayor Summey couldn't immediately be reached for comment.

(Clarification: This story's original headline said the lane reversals would happen in Summer 2019. S.C. DOT officials asked us to clarify that while it's very possibly the reversals will happen in the summer months, it's not certain. The reversals will happen sometime between now and the first three months of 2020.)