WILLIMANTIC, Conn. --  Junior Ryan Sirois (Tolland) and senior Emmanuel Agyemang (East Hartford) scored six minutes apart early in the match as the Eastern Connecticut State University men's soccer team moved within a win of its third consecutive outright Little East Conference regular-season title with a 3-1 victory over Keene State College Monday afternoon at Thomas Nevers Field.
 
With its seventh home win in eight starts, Eastern (10-6-0, 6-1-0 LEC) now has 18 points in the conference, breaking a three-way tie for second place and moving into first place, two points ahead of the University of Massachusetts Boston. Eastern closes out with an LEC match Saturday at home against the University of Massachusetts Dartmouth at 1 p.m. UMass Boston (12-2-1, 5-1-1 LEC visits Castleton University (4-11-0, 2-5-0 LEC) Friday in its LEC and regular-season finale.
 
An Eastern tie and a UMass Boston win would, unofficially, make the two teams regular-season co-champions, but Eastern would earn the No. 1 playoff seed by virtue of its 1-0 victory at UMass Boston five weeks ago.
 

Eastern, which has outscored its opponent 33-4 at home this year, took a 2-0 lead on goals by Sirois and Agyemang 19 minutes into the match, and made it 3-0 in the opening seven minutes of the second half on a header from senior Will Toomey (Willington).
 
Keene had defeated Eastern, 1-0, on the Warriors' home field in the 2019 LEC championship game and brought a 5-1-2 record in its last eight matches into play Monday. The Owls, who were outshot, 16-10, and lost the corner kick battle, 11-3 Monday, cut the three-goal gap to two when sophomore Nicholas Dalesio  hammered a 12-yarder past a diving sophomore keeper Nathan Yeich (Willington) from the middle of the box on an entry pass from freshman Casey McCarthy midway through the second half.
 
Agyemang had a goal and assist -- the tenth goal of his career -- and junior Larson Richards (Mansfield) had his second straight two-assist contest. Sirois took over the team lead with his fifth goal of the year and gave the Warriors an early lead in the 13^th minute when he converted a pass from Agyemang, who stole the ball at midfield. Not long after that, Agyemang rifled a hard shot from the left of the box past Keene senior keeper Anthony Pasciuto for his fourth goal of the year that made it 2-0. Toomey's third goal of the year in the opening minutes of the second half more or less sealed the win. Richards began the play with a long free kick to first-year player Sean Cafferty (Clinton) who leaped above three defenders at the top of the box and headed it to Toomey, who, in turn, headed it past Pasciuto from six yards.
 
Sophomore keeper Dylan Pallanck (Willington) made four saves in 47:31 shutout minutes for his ninth win of the year, while Yeich stopped one shot and allowed Dalesio's goal over the final 42:29.  Pasciuto made six saves.
 
Eastern has now won at least ten matches (also winning nine twice) in 11 of head coach Greg DeVito's 14 full seasons (not counting the 2020 Covid season).