BABSON PARK, Mass.—Senior Lauren Gips (Winter Park, Fla.) finished with 14 kills and a match-high four blocks to help Babson College defeat visiting Saint Michael's College in three sets, 25-21, 25-20, 26-24, in non-conference women's volleyball action on Friday night inside Staake Gymnasium. 

With its ninth consecutive victory, Babson improves to 13-1 on the year. Saint Michael's drops to 4-9 with the loss. 

Junior Isabella Allen (Williamsville, N.Y.) hit .692 recording nine kills without an error in 13 swings, while sophomore Hailey Fouche (Montclair, N.J.) added seven kills and two blocks for the Beavers. Fellow sophomore Zoe Ackerman (Aurora, Colo.) dished out 30 assists and junior Sophia Shaw (Novato, Calif.) and senior Tatum Stelter (Glendale, Ariz.) registered 11 and 10 digs, respectively, in the victory. 

First-year Nora Schulze (Hingham, Mass.) led all players with 19 kills while hitting .424 to pace the Purple Knights. Senior Alexandra Baez Rentas (San Juan, Puerto Rico) contributed 28 assists, 13 digs and five kills, while sophomore Kyla Farnan (Phoenix, Ariz.) led all players with 16 digs in the loss. 

The Green and White scored three points on the serve of Fouche and four more on Ackerman's serve to build an 11-3 advantage early in game one. The Beavers took their largest lead of the stanza at 16-6 and got kills from four different players over their final six points to hold off a late rally by the visitors. 

Babson led by as many as five on two occasions early in the second but was up by just one before creatin separation with a 7-2 run. Gips and Ackerman recorded back-to-back kills to make it 16-13 and the trio of Gips, Fouche and Allen combined for four kills to give the hosts its largest margin of the frame at 21-15 on the way to taking a two-set edge. 

Game three featured 10 ties and seven lead changes before the Beavers used kills by Allen and Fouche during a 4-1 spurt to forge a 21-15 advantage. The margin was 22-17 after another kill by Allen before Saint Michael's got six consecutive kills by Schulze and an ace by Farnan to go in front 24-22. 

Babson took advantage of back-to-back errors by the Purple Knights following a timeout to pull even and Gips followed with a pair of kills to finish off the sweep. 

Both teams return to action on Saturday as the Beavers host Wheaton at 11 a.m. and Roger Williams at 3 p.m., while Saint Michael's visits Saint Anselm at 12 p.m. 

MATCH NOTES
•    Friday's match was the first in program for Babson against Saint Michael's. 
•    Prior to the match, Babson recognized its three seniors - Gips, Stelter and Lauren Griffin (Los Altos Hills, Calif.) - who have helped the program win 67 matches while making three NCAA Tournament appearances since arriving on campus in the fall of 2021. 
•    With four blocks in the victory, Gips became the eighth player in school history with at least 500 kills and 200 blocks. 
•    The Beavers have won their last 28 matches when hitting .200 or better.
•    Ackerman has doled out at least 30 assists in five consecutive matches.