THE FLATS – Georgia Tech women’s basketball head coach Karen Blair announced on Thursday Catherine Alben has signed a grant-in-aid to join the Yellow Jackets for the 2025-26 season. Alben, who hails from Snellville, Ga., is the fourth Georgia native to return to the Peach State under Blair.
A highly-decorated student-athlete, Alben transfers to Georgia Tech with one year of eligibility remaining after playing three seasons at Charleston Southern. Alben, a 5-7 guard, collected Big South Conference honors all three seasons as a Buccaneer, earning first team recognition in 2024-25, second team as a sophomore (2023-24) and all-freshman accolades in 2022-23.
“Catherine is a really big piece for our program,” said Blair. “She brings a maturity that will be valuable for us both on and off the court. From the moment we connected with her, our staff loved her confidence and humility. Catherine is an experienced, dynamic guard that can attack the rim and stretch the floor with her three-point range. She will excel in our transition game and knows how to be disruptive on the defensive end.”
In three seasons at CSU, Alben took the floor in 88 contests and earned the start in 60. She surpassed the 1,000-career points mark last season and capped her time as a Buc with 1,176 career points for a 13.4 points per game average. She averaged 27.4 minutes per game, shooting 38.2 percent from the floor and 73.8 percent from the free throw line.
This past season, Alben was a three-time Big South player of the week selection after finishing her junior season averaging 16.6 points per game to lead the Bucs in scoring and rank second overall in the Big South. Alben helped the Bucs to 10 conference wins during the season, marking only the second time in program history reaching double-figure league wins, leading CSU with 175 field goals made, 55 three-point field goals and 42 steals. She scored 20-plus points in nine outings, including seven in conference play, and logged a career-high 29 points against Radford.
Her sophomore season (2023-24), Alben was second on the team in scoring, averaging 13.9 points per game and started all 30 contests, averaging 33.1 minutes. She led the team in steals (51) and scored 20-plus points in seven games to earn second team all-Big South recognition.
Alben produced an impressive freshman season at Charleston Southern, being voted Big South Freshman of the Week once and earning all-freshman team honors to cap her collegiate debut. She appeared in 29 games and led the team in scoring, while scoring in double-figures 12 times. Alben scored a then-career-high 25 points against Presbyterian.
Alben attended Grayson High School in Georgia, where she was a first-team all-region selection, averaging 18 points per game. She helped the Rams to back-to-back region titles in 2018-19 and 2019-20, and finished her high school career with over 1,000 career points.
Alben joins fellow signees Jada Crawshaw (Darwin, Australia/Long Beach State), La’Nya Foster (Riverdale, Ga./Austin Peay), Savannah Samuel (Woodstock, Ga./Boston College), Brianna Turnage (Atlanta, Ga./Florida State), Leyre Urdiain (Zaragoza, Spain) and Talayah Walker (Odenton, Md./Penn State) in joining the Yellow Jackets’ roster in 2025-26.
Full Steam Ahead
Full Steam Ahead is a $500 million fundraising initiative to achieve Georgia Tech athletics’ goal of competing for championships at the highest level in the next era of intercollegiate athletics. The initiative will fund transformative projects for Tech athletics, including renovations of Bobby Dodd Stadium at Hyundai Field (the historic home of Georgia Tech football), the Zelnak Basketball Center (the practice and training facility for Tech basketball) and O’Keefe Gymnasium (the venerable home of Yellow Jackets volleyball), as well as additional projects and initiatives to further advance Georgia Tech athletics through program wide-operational support. All members of the Georgia Tech community are invited to visit atfund.org/FullSteamAhead for full details and renderings of the renovation projects, as well as to learn about opportunities to contribute online.
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