WILLIMANTIC, Conn. – Third-seeded Keene State College came from 17 points back midway through the first half and fourth-seeded  Massachusetts Dartmouth eliminated the top seed in the semifinal round of the Little East Conference men's basketball tournament Saturday night at Francis E. Geissler Gymnasiuim.

For defending tournament champion Keene (17-10), Matt Ozzella scored 19 points and the Owls used a 17-2 run late in the first half to get back into contention and eventually defeated No. 7 Rhode Island College (6-21) in Saturday's second semifinal to move into Sunday's 2 p.m. championship game at Geissler Gym. UMass Dartmouth (17-10) erased two regular-season losses to top-ranked Eastern Connecticut State University (18-9) to defeat the Warriors, 60-55, in Saturday's first semifinal.

Keene looks for its third tournament title in the past 13 years. UMass Dartmouth, which had captured ten of the first 15 LEC tournament titles, returns to the title game for the first time since defeating Rhode Island College in 2009.

UMass Dartmouth missed ten of its first 12 shots against Eastern before rallying from an 11-point deficit midway through the first half. In a game featuring the LEC's top offensive team (UMD) against the No.-1 ranked defensive squad, UMass shot 54.2 percent in the second half to rally from a four-point halftime deficit.

Senior guard Jordan Rezendes of UMD – the conference's top scorer – finished with 20 points and eight rebounds, Abi Akanni adding 16 points (14 in the second half) and Jon Robinson 12 points. The Warriors shot under 28 percent in the game, including 12.0 percent (3-of-25) from three-point range.

Conference rebounding leader Hugh Lindo's (Enfield) season-high 21 rebounds (two shy of his career best) helped Eastern to a +10 advantage on the boards against the Corsairs. Lindo also had ten points. Trachone Preston (Enfield) paced the Warriors with 13 points and pulled down seven rebounds but was 5-of-22 from the floor. Tarchee Brown (Rockville) came off the bench for ten points and five assists.

After giving away its large early lead, Rhode Island pulled to within three with four minutes left after Keene's Tre' Tipton sank a three-pointer with 13:30 left that pushed the Owls' advantage to 14, 45-31. Rhode Island scored seven straight and made it a three-point game with four minutes left on Chris Green's three-point field goal. Ten seconds later, Lucas Hammel of Keene  converted one of his team's most important field goals when he swished a three-point to give Keene a six-point lead, 58-52, with 3:36 left.

Keene shot 56 percent from the floor in the second half and nailed more than half of its three-point attempts in the game (11-of-21).  Nate Stitchell followed Ozzella with 12 points and five rebounds, Tipton netting eight of his ten points in the second half.

Jimmy Fritzson scored 13 of his team-leading 16 points in the first half for Rhode Island, Green totaling 13 points and Malcolm Smith came off the bench for ten points.