Imagine doing something you love by helping a “team,” whether that’s your family, friends, or an actual sports team. This could be anything, from playing a game with your family to helping your friend with homework. Now imagine doing that thing 1,000 times. That is exactly what Caroline Davis—senior captain on the Emerson women’s volleyball team—did.
Davis earned her spot on Oct. 14 in the Emerson Volleyball 1,000 dig/kill & 2,500 assists club, a feat that only a handful of Emerson athletes have accomplished.
Davis, who did not have a freshman season in 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, reached 1,000 digs in less than three full seasons, making the accomplishment even more impressive. She’s totalled 1,089 career digs in just 65 matches, averaging a whopping 16 digs per match.
Head Coach Ben Read has nothing but praise to share about his go-to libero.
“She could’ve played at a lot of different places and luckily we were able to get her here,” Read said in an interview with the Beacon. “She is very responsible and has stepped into a leadership role the last couple years.”
Read feels Davis has fully embraced her role as the team’s captain, often one of the first to meet with recruits to show them around and make them feel at home.
Rachel Dickerson, a first-year outside hitter on the volleyball team, shared how Davis has been a role model for her to look to.
“Davis is a really great leader and is really encouraging,” Dickerson said. “She is always so supportive if I do something wrong, she always corrects me.”
Though she has accumulated impressive statistics during her volleyball career at Emerson, Davis’ teammates view her as far more than the points she has earned. One of Davis’ close friends on the team, sophomore libero Allie Montenegro, spoke of Davis’ dual roles as both role model and friend to her during their time together on the team.
“Davis has been a really big mentor, especially since we play the same position,” Montenegro said. “She is a really good role model for passing, but also emotional support.”
This sentiment is shared among the entire team. In the Oct. 14 game against United States Coast Guard Academy that earned Caroline Davis her 1000th dig, her teammates had signs celebrating her achievement.
“I was not counting [digs],” she said. “Everyone else knew. I dug the ball, and I heard screaming, and I was like, ‘why are they screaming?’”
She eventually turned around and saw the team cheering for her with their signs reading “1000 digs!” and she realized what had happened.
Though she was never fully confident that she would achieve it, Davis said that she aspired to join the 1,000 Digs Club.
“I didn’t think I was going to get it, but it was always one of my goals while I was here to specifically get on that banner,” Davis said. “It felt surreal when it happened.”
Davis’ name is set to be added to “that banner”—the Emerson Volleyball 1000 Dig/Kill & 2500 Assists Club banner in the Bobbi Brown and Steven Plofker Gym—next summer. Though Davis will have graduated and moved off campus, her volleyball legacy will remain.
