Rutgers-Camden Head Volleyball Coach David Gurst, left, with his 2024 coaching staff Lydia Bauer and Paul Lano on the deck of the Battleship New Jersey
Raptors' Gurst selected as coach with USA Volleyball program
CAMDEN, N.J. (Dec. 17, 2024) –
David Gurst has been a mainstay with the Rutgers University-Camden volleyball program for the past decade, but as he prepares for his 11th season as the Scarlet Raptors' head coach, he has added a national-level coaching spot.
Gurst has been selected as a coach with USA Volleyball's Sitting National Team Development Program (SNTDP). His first experience with the program will come Feb. 6-9 at the program's training site in Edmond, Oklahoma. The national development camp will include roughly 50 athletes ranging in age from around 15 to the mid-30's, held on the campus of NCAA Division II volleyball powerhouse the University of Central Oklahoma.
The USA Volleyball website notes that "The Sitting National Team Development Program welcomes athletes with physical disabilities to learn and train in sitting volleyball toward National Team consideration. Through rear-round training camps, athletes develop their volleyball skills and learn team strategies that will prepare them to compete at the elite/international level."
Camps will be held at the University of Central Oklahoma throughout the year, beginning with the Feb. 6-9 dates and followed by another camp on March 6-9. Although Gurst will is committed to the Rutgers-Camden program during the fall semester, the SNTDP program is tentatively slated to participate in the Youth Para Pan American Games in Santiago, Chile, during the October/November time period.
"I'm grateful for the opportunity to work with these outstanding athletes," said Gurst, who is Rutgers-Camden's winningest volleyball coach with 127 victories. He has led the Scarlet Raptors to five appearances in the New Jersey Athletic Conference playoffs and four berths in the ECAC playoffs, including a trip to the ECAC finals in 2021.
Gurst has coached 14 All-New Jersey Athletic Conference volleyball players over the years, including a pair of NJAC Rookies of the Year, two AVCA All-Region 4 honorees and the only AVCA All-American in program history, when
Kaliyah Moss was tabbed as an All-America Honorable Mention player in 2021.
Gurst's athletes also have earned 27 NJAC Academic honors so far, with the conference academic awards for the 2024-25 scholastic year scheduled to be announced in May.
A 1980 graduate of Cherry Hill High School East, Gurst graduated in 1984 from Glassboro State College with a Bachelor's degree in Health and Physical Education. A long-time Health/PE teacher at Cherry Hill High School West, he coached numerous sports at the high school level from 1984 until taking the job at Rutgers-Camden in 2015. During his scholastic coaching career at Saddle River Day School, Cherry Hill East and Cherry Hill West he captured multiple conference titles in volleyball and softball and led the Cherry Hill West swimming team to five South Jersey and two state championships.
Gurst was a six-time recipient of the Cherry Hill West Coach of the Season honor and he received the prestigious NJEA Public School Hero Award in 2008.
