Women's Volleyball vs. Springfield
NEWMAC Tournament Semifinal
Saturday, November 5 | 3:30 p.m.
Rockwell Cage | Cambridge, Mass.
SERIES HISTORY
• Babson is 8-19 all-time against Springfield in a series that dates back to 1998.
• All eight of the Beavers' wins in the all-time series have come since 2013 and four of them have come in five sets.
• The team taking the first set has gone on to win the match in 10 of the last 12 contests between Babson and Springfield.
POSTSEASON HISTORY
• Babson and Springfield will meet for the second year in a row and fourth time overall in the conference playoffs on Saturday.
• The Beavers defeated the Pride in four sets in the 2017 quarterfinals and 2018 NEWMAC championship match before dropping a five-set decision in last year's semifinals.
LAST MEETING
• Junior Lauren Gips hit .417 and registered a career-high 18 kills, while senior Jordan Lapins added 13 kills and 17 digs to help the Beavers rally for a five-set victory (17-25, 25-27, 25-20, 25-20, 15-12) win over Springfield on September 20 in Babson Park.
• Graduate student Izzy Seebold handed out 50 assists and first-year Roz Cabuena led all players with 27 digs for the Beavers, who hit .230 over the final three sets.
• Natalie Billet recorded 13 kills and 12 digs, Maeve Voltz had eight kills and five blocks, and Ally Townsend contributed 26 digs to lead the Pride.
SCOUTING THE BEAVERS
• Second-seeded Babson (20-7) advanced to the semifinals for the eighth year in a row with a 3-1 win over seventh-seeded Clark in Tuesday's quarterfinals.
• Seniors Lauren MacDonald and Martina Jankovic Chin both finished with 16 kills and five blocks and Seebold added 55 assists, 10 digs and four blocks for the Beavers, who registered a season-high 11 total blocks.
• First-year Isabella Allen is fifth in the conference averaging 2.86 kills per set, Gips ranks among the top 10 in the league in kills per set (2.74), blocks per set (0.86) and hitting percentage (.326), and Jankovic Chin is contributing 2.34 kills and is second on the team with 47 total blocks.
• Seebold is averaging a league-high 10.22 assists per set, while Cabuena ranks fourth in the NEWMAC in digs per set (4.66).
SCOUTING THE PRIDE
• Third-seeded Springfield (18-8) will make it second consecutive NEWMAC Tournament semifinal appearance thanks to a 3-0 win over sixth-seeded Coast Guard on Tuesday.
• Riley Donahue led all players with 16 kills and first-year Megan Kirtyan handed out 34 assists for the Pride, which hit.301 on the night.
• Donahue ranks second in the conference in kills per set (3.39) to go along with 2.55 digs, Billet is contributing 2.07 kills and Voltz (1.61 k/s, 0.99 b/s) is third in the NEWMAC in blocks.
• Kirtyan is dishing out 7.45 assists per set and Townsend is averaging a league-best 5.26 digs per set.
PLAYOFF SUCCESS
• Babson has captured four of the last seven NEWMAC Tournament championships (2014, 2015, 2018, 2019) and has made seven consecutive semifinal appearances during this stretch.
• The Beavers have gone 14-3 overall in the conference playoffs during this run, which includes a 4-3 record in semifinal matches.
REGIONAL IMPACT
• Babson was second behind No. 20 MIT for the second week in a row, while Springfield was fifth when the NCAA released its third Region II rankings on Wednesday.
• The Beavers, who are 4-7 against regionally-ranked foes, and the Pride have an opportunity to improve their NCAA Tournament resumes when they meet on Saturday.
DOUBLING UP
• Seebold recorded her fifth double-double of the year against Clark and finished with 50 or more assists for the fourth time this season.
• The 55 assists versus the Cougars were the most in a four-set match this season for Seebold, who ranks first on the program's single-season list in assists per set (10.22) and 11th in total assists (705).
STATS WATCH
• Jankovic Chin has totaled 33 kills and is averaging 4.71 kills per set while hitting .323 over her last two matches.
• MacDonald's set a new career high with her 16 kills on Tuesday night, eight of which came in the opening set.
• McShane's 13 kills in Tuesday's win matched her career high set back on September 3 against Pomona-Pitzer, and in two career NEWMAC Tournament matches she has 21 kills and is averaging 3.00 kills per set while hitting .264.
• Gips has recorded seven or more kills in 10 of her last 11 matches and is averaging 2.81 kills per set during this stretch.
NUMBERS TO KNOW
• The Beavers are 17-0 this season when winning the first set.
• Babson is 13-0 this season and 77-2 since 2018 when hitting .200 or better.
• The Green and White is 16-0 when holding its opponents to a hitting percentage of .150 or less but just 3-7 when they finish above this mark.
• The Beavers are 4-2 on the year in neutral court matches.
• Since 2014, Babson is 5-2 in NEWMAC Tournament matches inside MIT's Rockwell Cage.
UP NEXT
• The winner of Saturday's semifinal will take on either top-seeded and 20th-ranked MIT or fifth-seeded Smith in the NEWMAC Tournament final on Sunday at 1 p.m.
