Dreyer twins living large

They are prized teen prospects in volleyball and football respectively. When you meet them, you can understand why. Alexa is a powerful 6-3, 170-pound middle-blocker who has earned a national reputation; Jack is a strapping 6-8, 285-pound offensive tackle whose football potential has only begun to be tapped.

They are relatively young for their high school class; they are still 16 years old. They won’t be 17 until July 19. They begin their senior year in August.

Alexa attends Archbishop Mitty High School in San Jose. Jack, who has plenty of time to grow some more, has a much shorter prep trip, just over a mile south to Serra High School on West 20th Avenue in San Mateo.

It’s not often that twins of such imposing stature and accomplishment grace the local high school athletic scene. It’s possible that the Dreyers, engaging, articulate, mature and polite, may be the most heavily-recruited, top-caliber, local twins since the gifted Ted and Terri Stickles swam for Hillsdale High School and beyond at a high international level in the late 1950s and through much of the 1960s.

Alexa, a member of the U.S. national 16-under volleyball team a year ago, has already verbally committed to attend UCLA next year.

“When I visited UCLA,” she said recently, “I knew that was the place for me.”

Her 3.75 GPA will fit right in there.

She attends Mitty, in large measure, because of its outstanding volleyball program. The Monarchs, coached by Brett Almazan-Cezar, have captured the past two Division II California state volleyball championships, with Alexa as a key contributor in the front row.

Alexa emphasized that her club team, Vision Volleyball of Los Gatos, and its coaches, including Almazan-Cezar, have been very instrumental in her success as well.

Almazan-Cezar said Alexa is one of Mitty’s best middle-blockers in some time.

“Not many freshmen start at Mitty,” he said. “Alexa did. And the fact that she’s going to play in the Pac-12 says a lot.”

Because of her relative youth, she may have some growing left as well, he said.

Jack, the tallest offensive lineman in Serra history, currently has 13 scholarship offers in hand. Half the schools in the Pac-12 are among those interested in his considerable services. His status on the recruiting charts has been rising quickly this summer.

He hasn’t made a decision on his college selection yet.

“I probably won’t until the football season is over,” he said. “The process has been a blessing.”

He noted that he has not made an initial contact with any school; all of them have taken the lead in that regard, testimony to the young man’s intriguing, budding physical dominance and his eye-popping physical stature.

Jack, who did not play football until his freshman year at Serra, credited his high school coach, Patrick Walsh, with guiding him to this point. Walsh, who is beginning his 14th season at Serra, praised his towering lineman and the progress he is making and noted that, “I believe the sky is the limit for him.”

Alexa said she has been playing volleyball since the fifth grade. What about basketball?

“I’ve been asked to play many times,” she said. “But it’s really hard to juggle basketball and volleyball schedules.”

No matter. Her choice was made years ago. Her volleyball prowess is her ticket to a free, or reduced-price, higher education.

Jack’s 4.25 GPA opens a lot of academic/athletic doors as well. Ivy League schools like Harvard, Yale, Dartmouth and Brown continue to pursue him vigorously.

The twins, who attended Baywood Elementary School and Borel Middle School, both near their home in San Mateo, were not unusually big at birth. According to their parents, Steve and Maia Dreyer, Alexa and Jack were born prematurely in 1997. The babies weighed 5 pounds each; they were about 20 inches long.

“They spent time in an incubator,” recalled Maia, a Southern Californian from Manhattan Beach who is 6-3 herself. Steve is 6-5 and a former basketball player in the hoops-crazed state of Indiana.

The parents smile and muse about the care and feeding of their twins — not to mention their 14-year-old daughter, Ashley, a 6-1 student-athlete who will attend and play volleyball at Menlo School as a freshman during the upcoming fall semester.

Asked where the family, which moved to San Mateo in 2000, shops for food, Steve responded, “Costco.”

Maia corrected him,.

“Yes. And Trader Joe’s, Safeway and the rest.”

It’s not out of the ordinary for the family to go through more than a gallon-and-a-half of milk per day. The Dreyer refrigerator is under near-constant assault on a daily basis.

It was pointed out that Jack, in particular, tends to graze with regularity. No surprise there. He’s still filling out his young frame. And a steady supply of fuel is an absolute priority.

Hello, Smart & Final.

Contact John Horgan by email at johnhorganmedia@gmail.com.