April 04, 2022
Lukas Yurasits ’22 doesn’t shy away from a challenge.
The senior guard from New York, New York, Yurasits has developed from a player who came off the bench his first year to the men’s basketball team’s leading scorer – hitting 1,000 points in his final season, a feat he was able to pull off in only three years.
While his accomplishments in O.W. Houts Gymnasium are impressive, even more impressive is Yurasits’ commitment in the classroom, as noted by his honors as Landmark Men’s Basketball Scholar-Athlete of the Year and CoSIDA Academic All-American.
A double major in chemistry and physics through Susquehanna’s 3+2 engineering program, Yurasits maintains a 3.94 grade point average and has gained membership into honor societies for chemistry, entrepreneurship, math and physics. He is also an active member of Susquehanna’s Student Athlete Advisory Council.
“I think the thing I am most proud of is being an Academic All-American. It really showed the amount of work I have put in and the foundation I created for myself before I even came to Susquehanna,” Yurasits said. “That award really showed all my work was recognized and that it paid off in the long run.”
Not that it has always been easy. Susquehanna’s 3+2 engineering program is academically demanding, and Yurasits was instrumental in the men’s basketball team clinching the 2022 Landmark championship. Mastering time management has been key.
“I always felt that athletics has kept me in line with my time management because I know that if I have practice or a game and work to do, I have to really plan my time,” he said. “I would always have a checklist of my assignments or plans to make sure that I could check them off. Basketball always kept me from procrastinating.”
Yurasits also has a heart for service. During the peak of the pandemic, he volunteered at a kitchen in upstate New York prepping meals and delivering food to people struggling to consistently provide for their families, whether it was due to job layoffs or lack of resources as a result of Covid-19 shutdowns.
“I’d say understanding my privilege in life is what has motivated me to want to help others,” Yurasits said. “Growing up in New York City playing basketball and going from court to court, I saw a lot of guys who haven’t had it as well as I’ve had.”
Coach Frank Marcinek acknowledged the correlation between Yurasits’ character off the court and his success on it.
“Lukas is a winner,” Marcinek said. “He’s a winner as a person; he’s a winner in the classroom; he’s a winner on the court.”
Yurasits plans to pursue a degree in engineering at either Columbia University or Washington University of St. Louis in the fall. He hopes to parlay his love of sports with his degree in engineering.
“I want to focus on material science engineering. My dream job would be to engineer sneakers for athletes,” he said. “I want to help develop or create new materials that not only have more function and are supportive, but also are sustainable and more environmentally friendly.”