Box Score WILLIMANTIC, Conn. – The Eastern Connecticut State University men's basketball team clinched the No. 1 seed in the Little East Conference tournament for the second time in three years Saturday, shooting 52 percent in the second half to post a 79-73 victory over the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth at Francis E. Geissler Gymnasium.
At right: Mike Garrow
With its 12th conference victory without a loss – the program's most regular-season conference wins ever -- Eastern (18-5 overall) clinches no worse than a share of its second conference regular-season title in three years and moves to within two wins of becoming the first conference team in the 17-year history of the 14-game conference season to finish unbeaten (UMass Dartmouth is the only team to go unbeaten in 28 years of conference play, winning all ten of its games in 1986-87 and 1992-93. The Warriors host Western Connecticut State University Tuesday and visit the University of Southern Maine Saturday in concluding the LEC regular season.
Senior forward Mike Garrow (Terryville) scored ten of his career-high 31 points in the first six minutes of the second half to help the Warriors race from a one-point halftime deficit to an eight-point, 49-41 lead. Leading by six points with seven minutes left, the Warriors ran off seven straight points to take a comfortable 13-point, 70-57 lead with 2:26 left on the way to their tenth straight win over UMass Dartmouth (14-9, 7-5 Little East).
Coming off two straight conference wins, UMass Dartmouth slips from third place into a tie for third with Western Connecticut, which downed visiting Keene State College, 98-85, Saturday. The top four seeds host the bottom four seeds in the LEC tournament's first round a week from Tuesday.
Forward Hugh Lindo (Enfield), ranked third in the conference as the LEC's top freshman, grabbed a career-high 18 rebounds andn Garrow eight for the Warriors, the conference's top-ranked team in rebounding margin.
Sophomore guard Kevin Leumene (Stamford) followed Garrow with 15 points, sophomore guard Trachone Preston (Enfield) added 14 points. Senior guard Brian Salzillo (North Haven) played seven minutes off the bench after sitting out four games due to illness. Ranked second nationally in three-point field goals made per game, Salzillo had a streak of 53 straight games with a three-pointer ended when he was 0-for-3 from behind the arc.
The Warriors led by as many as 13 points five minutes into the game, but the Corsairs battled back to finally take a 31-30 lead with 3:31 left in the stanza and took that one-point advantage into the lockerroom. Sophomore forward Abi Akanni and freshman guard Tucker Bouchard each scored ten points in the half for UMass, which more than half (18) of its 35 first-half points off of Eastern's 11 turnovers.
The Corsairs outscored Eastern by nine points from the floor, but Eastern outscored the visitors by 15 from the foul line. In a game featuring the LEC's top free-throw shooting teams, Eastern was 23-of27, top-rated UMass just 8-of-10. Third-ranked Garrow was 8-of-11 while second-ranked junior guard Jake Laga did not have an attempt.
Bouchard, who torched Eastern for 30 points in his team's nine-point home loss to Eastern a month ago, was 3-for-12 from the floor, but finished as one of UMD's four double-digit scorers. Steven Handy came off the bench to lead UMass with 14 points (7-of-11 from the floor), with Laga adding 13 and Akanni 12. Sophomore center Wale Abraham had nine points and a team-high seven rebounds for the Corsairs.
Eastern hosts Western Connecticut State University Tuesday at 7:30 p.m. in a Little East Conference game.
