WILLIMANTIC, Conn. --- The Eastern Connecticut State University men's basketball team moved to within one win of becoming the first team in the history of the Little East Conference to win all 14 of its regular-season games with a 74-59 win over Western Connecticut State University Wednesday night at Geissler Gym.

At right: Eastern seniors Attah Agyemang, Brian Bushey, Mike Garrow, Justin Nunez and Brian Salzillo and their families were honored before the game on Seniors' Night. (Photo by Liam Murphy)

Ranked fourth in the second NCAA Northeast Regional poll released Wednesday, Eastern (19-5, 13-0 Little East) used a 17-6 run to pull away after Western (15-8, 7-6 Little East) had taken its final lead, 43-42, seven minutes into the second half. Eastern shot only 37.5 percent from the floor but sank 23 of 33 free throws and turned the ball over only ten times to sweep Western in the regular-season series for the second straight year and claim its ninth home victory of the season (eighth straight) against a single loss.

Freshman forward Hugh Lindo (Enfield) pulled down a game-high 17 rebounds (eight in the first ten minutes of the game) to go along with 13 points, three blocks and three steals, and sophomore guard Trachone Preston (Enfield) scored a team-high 20 points. Senior swingman Mike Garrow (Terryville)  missed ten of his first 11 shots and managed only three first-half points, but finished with 15 points and added nine rebounds. He was 7-of-10 from the foul line – all in the second half . Lindo, a 37.5 percent free throw shooter, sank seven of nine from the stripe. Like Garrow, all of his attempts came in the second half to spark the Warriors to 21 of 29 from the line over the final 20 minutes.

Junior  center Joseph Groski  scored  15 of his game-high 21 points in the second half to help Western erase a six-point halftime deficit and move into its first of two second-half leads with 13:37 left in the game.

Western led by eight points early in the game and by seven when the Warriors ran off 20 points in a row to take command, 28-15 with five minutes left in the first half.  In addition to sinking his only field goal of the half in that 20-point stretch, Garrow contributed two rebounds and two assists. Preston scored nine of his 11 first-half points in that seven-minute span; and  freshman forward Brandon Kuczenski (Naugatuck) helped finish off the run with an inside basket, rebound, and assist.

Senior guard Brian Salzillo (North Haven) – the team's leading scorer and  second-ranked three-point shooter in Division III -- saw his most extensive playing time since sitting out four games with mono. Salzillo had eight points in 27 minutes. Junior forward Brandon Yarborough (Stamford) returned to action after missing two games with a concussion and had four points and three rebounds in 13 minutes off the bench.

Since the conference began playing a 14-game season in 1997-98, no team has gone undefeated. UMass Dartmouth is the only team to win all of its LEC regular-season games, going 10-0 in the first year of the conference in 1986-87 and again in 1992-93. In the current 14-game season, Keene State (2003-04) and Rhode Island College (2008-09 and last year) have lost only once.

A winner of 11 of its last 12 and nine of 11 on its opponent's court, Eastern closes out the regular season Saturday at the University of Southern Maine at 3 p.m. The top-seeded Warriors – who clinched the outright regular-season championship Tuesday when defending champion Rhode Island College lost to UMass Dartmouth  -- will host eight-seeded Massachusetts Boston in a first-round LEC game Tuesday at 7:30 p.m. If it advances, Eastern will host the LEC semifinals and final Feb. 28-March 1.