Following Pitt’s Final Four loss to Texas A&M on Thursday, Olivia Babcock won’t get the opportunity to add a national championship to her extensive list of individual accomplishments.
But Friday, the Panthers right-side hitter further etched her name into the Pitt athletics and NCAA volleyball history books, winning her second straight AVCA National Player of the Year Award.
Babcock, who just completed her junior campaign at Pitt, won the award in 2024, becoming the first Panther to do so. She now is the fifth player in the award’s 40-year history to win it back-to-back.
She also captured Right-Side Hitter of the Year honors from the AVCA on Friday.
One of the greatest to ever do it.
Olivia Babcock is your back-to-back @AVCAVolleyball National Player of the Year! ???? pic.twitter.com/EMBxbWdNq7
— Pitt Volleyball (@Pitt_VB) December 19, 2025
This season, Babcock started 34 of Pitt’s 35 matches, helping the team to a 30-5 record and fifth straight national semifinals appearance.
Babcock averaged a career-high 5.17 kills per set, finishing with 646 in total, along with the team leads in digs (261) and blocks (126).
For her efforts, Babcock won ACC and AVCA East Coast Region player of the year honors for the second consecutive season.
On Pitt’s journey to the Final Four, Babcock averaged six kills and 1.71 digs per set as the Panthers dispatched UMBC, Michigan, Minnesota and Purdue, winning Pittsburgh Regional Most Outstanding Player honors.
Babcock, a native of Los Angeles, Calif., has been named a first-team All-American in all of her three years at Pitt. She was both the AVCA and ACC freshman of the year in 2023 and has earned first-team All-ACC honors in three straight seasons, as well.
Along with Babcock, Wisconsin’s Mimi Colyer, Kentucky’s Eva Hudson and Nebraska’s Bergen Reilly were named AVCA National Player of the Year finalists.
Kathryn Plummer of Stanford (2017, 2018) was the last player to win the award back-to-back.
