Box Score Babson Park, Mass. - November 7, 2021 - The Springfield College women's volleyball team was defeated by No. 22 MIT in the New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) Championship on Sunday afternoon in Staake Gymnasium on the campus of Babson College. The Engineers prevailed by the scores of 25-18, 25-21, 25-15.
MIT, which was tied for 22nd in the most recent AVCA Division III National Coaches Poll, improved to 26-3 and earned the NEWMAC's automatic bid to the upcoming NCAA Division III Championship. The Pride dropped to 22-7 and will await its postseason fate during the NCAA Selection Show that will air at 12:30 pm on Monday afternoon on NCAA.com.
Today's championship pitted two of the top teams in New England against one another as both teams appeared in this week's NCAA Division III Regional Rankings, with MIT coming in at the top spot in Region II, while the Pride was ranked third.
First-year Natalie Billet (Commack, N.Y.) led all players with 12 kills, while classmate Kylie Wixted (Ronkonkoma, N.Y.) added eight kills and two blocks. Camryn Bancroft (Eastport, N.Y.) added eight kills and Briana Tovar (Tucson, Ariz.) registered a team-best 13 digs. Springfield hit .208 in the setback, with Sara Labadorf (Huntersville, N.C.) racking up 22 assists and six digs.
Annie Bryan was named the Most Outstanding Player of the tournament and posted 11 kills and a .360 hitting percentage in the victory. Consecrata Rozario recorded 11 kills and a .471 hitting effort and Lilly Edwards finished with 10 kills. Emily Cheng registered 40 assists and seven digs and Ottavia Personeni paced MIT with a match-high 19 digs.
Springfield opened up the game with a 7-4 lead after Abby Wright's (Manhattan Beach, Calif.) serve clipped the tape for an ace, but the Engineers stormed back with a 8-1 surge as the Pride called for their first timeout of the afternoon trailing 12-8. Springfield would answer back to knot the set up at 15 apiece following consecutive attack errors by the Engineers, only to have MIT score five-straight points to take control of the stanza. MIT would prevail by a 25-18 margin as Billet would have four of the Pride's 11 kills in the frame.
After a kill from Jamie Albrecht (Selden, N.Y.) pulled Springfield within 8-6 in the second, MIT rattled off 10 of the next 13 points to have their cushion balloon to 18-9. Facing a 10-point deficit, the Pride chipped away at the Engineers lead, Springfield used a 10-3 run of their own capped off by a big swing from Billet to pull within 24-21. However, MIT would put away their 14th kill of the frame to take a 25-21 win.
Billet would rip a kill off the MIT block to give Springfield an 8-7 edge in the third, but the Engineers would erupt on a 13-2 burst, fueled by four kills from Ella Gragg, to go up 20-10. MIT would benefit from back-to-back attack errors by the Pride to complete their three-game victory.
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