With the women’s volleyball team off to a shaky start, one senior is off to a hot start reaching a goal she set for herself freshman year.
“Ever since joining this team, it has always been a goal of mine to reach 1000 digs,” said senior defensive specialist, Gina Custer.
Custer reached the achievement that only six others in the program’s history have accomplished at the Haverford Fords Invitational when she picked up 67 digs in the tournament. The Cavaliers went up against Elizabethtown College, Eastern University and host Haverford College. The team lost all three of those matches.
Custer’s achievement came midway through the final match of the weekend against Haverford. Custer finished with a match high, 18 digs.
“When I knew I was about to hit 1000 digs, I was very excited,” Custer said. “Having it in the back of my mind was motivating me more and more every game.”
She entered the season with 862 digs under her belt already, just 138 digs away from her goal. It only took Custer seven matches this season to get her name into the record book.
Custer grew up not too far from campus in King of Prussia and attended Archbishop Carroll. There she helped lead the Patriots to an Archdiocese of Philadelphia Championship and back-to-back Philadelphia Catholic League Championships. She was also honored with All-Catholic honors and PA All-State during her high school years in volleyball.
“I started playing volleyball when I was 10 years old in 5th grade and have played for the past 12 years of my life. I also started club volleyball when I was in 6th grade and played for seven years as well,” Custer said. ” I started playing volleyball because my mom signed me up for almost every sport growing up. Because of that, I was exposed to it young and also had great coaches who influenced my love for the sport at such a young age.”
This is not the first achievement the early childhood education major has been recognized for at Cabrini. Back in 2019, she was named to the All-Atlantic East 1st team, Atlantic East Specialty Player of the Week (9/3) and led the team and ranked 5th in the Atlantic East with 484 digs. The awards kept up the following year as the student-athlete was also named to the 2020-21 Atlantic East Conference All-Academic Team.
Custer had knocked down one of her personal goals for the season, now she wants to complete her goal for the team. She has had some of her best matches in the postseason, and the senior plans on continuing that trend. Custer put up 35 digs against Wesley College in the 2019 Atlantic East Conference Tournament during her sophomore season. That was her career high until the match against Elizabethtown during the tournament when she had 37 digs.
“My goal for my team this year is to win our conference and make a run in the NCAAs,” Custer said.
