EAST LANSING, Michigan- Maryland Eastern Shore battled against a tough squad from DePaul, but in the end the Blue Demons defeated the Hawks in straight sets (22-25, 18-25, 18-25) at the Spartan Classic on Friday. With the loss The Shore drops their fifth in a row and 7-7 overall, while the Blue Demons improved to 6-4.

Sophomore Lucia Babic (Sisak, Croatia) led the way in kills with nine, while freshman Iva Vujosevic (Bar, Montenegro) completed six kills with a success rate of 35.7 percent. Fellow freshman Ivana Blazevic (Zagreb, Croatia) assisted of 25 of the team's 31 kills. Senior Mere Serea (Suva, Fiji) added two solo blocks and four block assists.

DePaul was led by Brittany Maxwell's game high 13 kills and eight digs from Colleen Smith.

The first set played tight early, with DePaul holding a small but steadily growing lead. That Blue Demon advantage would grow to seven points at 20-13 when the Hawks rallied back. A Vujosevic kill put Babic at the service position, and she supplied two aces in a five point run that cut the deficit to two. Sophomore Zuzana Ondruskova (Bilovec, Czech Republic) struck home a kill to trim into the DePaul lead even further, but the Hawks could not regain the lead, ultimately losing the set by three.

Set two and three went in a similar way. DePaul would build a gradual lead on the way to taking the game. In the third frame, however, the Hawks managed a small lead until the 9-9 mark, when a kill by DePaul's Jasmine King gave the Blue Demons the lead for good.

The Hawks wrap up their stay in Michigan Saturday with an 11:30 a.m. match with host Michigan State.