Babson Park, MA --- Seniors Laney Reed (West Chester, PA) and Caroline DiGiovanni (Harwich, MA) tallied a pair of first-half goals as No. 6 Babson College blanked visiting WPI, 2-0, in a New England Women's and Men's Athletic Conference (NEWMAC) field hockey game Saturday afternoon at MacDowell Field.
 
With their sixth consecutive victory, the Beavers improve to 10-1 overall and 3-0 in the NEWMAC while the Engineers had a five-game winning streak snapped and drop to 8-3 overall and 3-1 in conference play.
 
First-year Madison Tibbals (Gorham, ME) registered her second shutout of the season for the Beavers, which had a 20-3 margin in total shots and a 12-0 advantage in shots on goal.
 
Sophomore Myles Lakin (Reading, MA) made 10 saves in goal for the Engineers for netminders  ourth double-digit save effort on the season.
 
The Beavers got on the scoreboard in just the fifth minute of play. After Lakin made a stop on a shot by DiGiovanni and Reed hit the post on the rebound, Reed buried her own rebound past Lakin for her third goal of the season. Each team was awarded a pair of penalty corners the rest of the opening frame but none of them led to scoring chances.
 
WPI had a penalty corner in the first minute of the second quarter shot a shot by graduate student Lauren Meinhold (Boxboro, MA) was blocked and a loose ball by senior Leah Uglevich (Maynard, Mass.) was punched over top of the net.
 
Babson upped the pressure on the WPI goal in the second quarter with three corners and a pair of shots denied by Lakin. The Beavers finally broke through with less than three minutes remaining when sophomore Penny Baroni (Dennis, MA) fed DiGiovanni in the scoring zone, and she spun to her left and chipped a reverse shot over Lakin for her 10th goal of the season and a 2-0 lead at the break.
 
The Green and White kept WPI from any shots in the third quarter and junior Helen DiGiovanni (Harwich, MA) had the only shot for the home team, which was saved by Lakin. Babson outshot WPI 8-0 in the fourth quarter but Lakin made five stops in the final 15 minutes to prevent further damage.
 
Babson is home again on Tuesday hosting MIT at 6pm at MacDowell Field. WPI looks to get back on track next Saturday at home vs. Mount Holyoke at 3pm.
 
Release Courtesy Babson Sports Information