BIDDEFORD, Maine – With the release of the 2021 All-Commonwealth Coast Conference Women's Volleyball team, five student-athletes from Roger Williams earned All-CCC honors while also collecting three of the conference's major awards.
 
Katherine Pickard (St. Petersburg, Fla.) and Jaime Gaffga (Mattituck, N.Y.) highlight the Hawks' All-CCC selections as All-CCC First Team selections. Most notably, Pickard was honored as Co-CCC Player of the Year and CCC Scholar-Athlete of the Year, while Gaffga was named CCC Libero of the Year. Earning spots on the All-CCC Second Team were Kate Porter (Killingworth, Conn.) and Tori Melanson (North Attleboro, Mass.), while Jasmine Babbitt (Charlestown, R.I.) was named to the All-CCC Third Team.
 
Pickard was a major scoring weapon for Roger Williams this year. She led the league in kills per set (3.92) and averaged 4.5 points per set, which was also near the top of the CCC leaderboard. Nationally, her kills per set number ranked her 34th in among all NCAA Division III volleyball student-athletes. She registered double-digit kills in all but two of her matches this year with three 20-plus performances. She was also a contributor defensively with five double-digit dig matches, which gave her five double-doubles on the year. She was selected as the CCC Player of the Week twice (Weeks ending Oct. 10 and Oct. 24).
 
The senior outside hitter was also impressive in the classroom, maintaining a 4.0 GPA as she worked towards a double major in mathematics and finance. She has been a Dean's List honoree every semester dating back to the fall 2018 and will be graduating in December. She was the recipient of the Presidential Academic Scholarship at Roger Williams and was very involved on campus. Pickard held membership in the RWU Honors Program, the National Math Honor Society, and the Ski Club and also founded and ran a non-profit called "Youth Partners with Haiti." She is currently completing her honors program thesis on "Why Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) Practices are Critical in Today's Society and the Value ESG Adds to a Company From the Market Perspective."
 
Gaffga served as the Roger Williams libero for the whole season and was a strong presence on the defensive side of the net. She finished the regular season averaging 4.68 digs per set, which was good for second in the conference. Gaffga recorded double-digit digs in all but one of her matches this year and eclipsed the 20-dig mark six times. She was named the CCC Libero of the Week twice (Weeks ending Oct. 10 and Oct. 24).
 
Porter enjoyed a career season in her first year as the Hawks' primary setter. She leads the conference in assists per set and ranks 41^st among all NCAA Division III players, averaging 9.49 per game. Her 655 total assists also place her third in the CCC. She began the season with the best match of her career against Eastern Conn. St., notching a career-high to that point in assists (59) and digs (15).
 
Melanson also is putting up career numbers in her senior season for Roger Williams. She ranks fourth in the conference with a .335 hitting percentage. In addition, she is one of the top blockers in the conference as she ranks in the top ten in solo blocks (18, 2^nd), block assists (39, 9^th), and total blocks (57, 7^th). Similar to Porter, she set a career high with 17 kills against Eastern Conn. St. in the team's season opener.
 
Babbitt has made a major impact for the Hawks in her first collegiate season. Her .308 hitting percentage puts her fifth in the conference while she is second in the CCC with 51 block assists and 0.87 blocks per set, fifth with 60 total blocks, and ninth with nine solo blocks. In a 3-1 win over Nichols on October 13, she logged a career-high 11 kills in the match.