MANCHESTER, N.H. – The Saint Anselm College women's volleyball team concluded its regular season with a 3-0 win over Southern Connecticut State University on Senior Day.

The Hawks will enter the Northeast-10 Conference postseason with a 20-8 record overall and closed its NE10 slate with a 9-3 record. The Owls drop to 16-14 on the season and 5-7 in conference matches. Saint Anselm will be the fifth-seed in the NE10 postseason and will head to crosstown rival Southern New Hampshire University on Thursday, Nov. 10 for the conference Quarterfinals match. The time of the match is to be announced. 

The Hawks posted set win scores of 25-23, 25-15, and 25-18 in the victory. Saint Anselm has reached 20 wins in a single season for the second time in the last three full seasons of competition and the 2022 squad becomes just the fifth team in program history to reach 20 wins in a single season.

Seniors Caroline Belmontez (San Diego, Calif.), Michelle Henwood (Guaynabo, Puerto Rico), Colleen Chen (Superior, Colo.), Kristen O'Keefe (Medford, Mass.), Lois Dogbe (Winchester, Calif.), and Lauren Casey (Jefferson City, Mo.) make up the Saint Anselm volleyball Class of 2023 which was honored with a pre-match Senior Day ceremony.

Chen led the Hawks with seven kills on a team-high 20 attempts, part of an offensive attack that registered 35 kills in the three-set match. Henwood threw up a match-high 16 assists and added four aces in the service game. Belmontez paced the Saint Anselm defense with 12 digs, extending her streak of double-digit digs to six matches. O'Keefe registered a match-high five assisted blocks.

The Hawks used a pair of five-point runs to hold a 17-8 lead but six of the next seven points went in the Owls favor, cutting the Saint Anselm advantage to 18-14. After trading of scores pushed the opening set to 23-19, three consecutive points by the visitors made the set a one-point battle but kills from sophomore Gabby Belcher (Buckeye, Ariz.) and Henwood sandwiched a kill from Gabriela Gaibur to close set one at 25-23 for the Hawks.

Saint Anselm rattled off 12 of the first 13 points to open the second set and never looked back. Kills from O'Keefe and sophomore Kennedy Scheppler (Lubbock, Texas) pushed the second set to 22-10 and the squads would swap scores down the stretch, leading to the Saint Anselm 25-15 win in the second frame.

After an early back-and-forth battle to open set three, six consecutive points by Saint Anselm gave the hosts a 19-12 lead. Three consecutive points by the Owls cut the Hawks lead to five at 21-16 but three of the final four points on kills by Chen, Dogbe, and Casey closed set three at 25-18 and the match by a 3-0 score.