DARTMOUTH, Mass – Senior midfielder Haley Montesanto (East Haven) scored her first goal in a month with 19 minutes left and the Eastern Connecticut State University women's soccer team allowed only one University of Massachusetts Dartmouth shot to reach net as the Warriors moved closer to a first-round Little East Conference home match with a 1-0 victory  in the final game of the regular season Friday night at Cressy Field.

Now 25-0-1  against UMass (1-13-1, 0-8-0 LEC) in the last 26 meetings, Eastern (7-7-2, 4-2-2 LEC) moved closer to earning a first-round LEC tournament home match after posting its third conference shutout in the last three weeks. Unofficially, Eastern will host a first-round match Tuesday as either the third or fourth seed if the University of Southern Maine loses or ties against LEC leader and No. 24 nationally-ranked Western Connecticut State University Saturday at Gorham, ME.

Since recording a hat trick in the second match of the season September 7 at McCarthy Field, Montesanto had scored just once -- in a 1-1 overtime tie at the University of Southern Maine Sept. 25. Montesanto's ninth career goal was set up by sophomore midfielder Victoria Roman's (Mexico City, MX) second assist of the year in the 71^st minute.

In addition to owning eight of the nine corner kicks in the game, Eastern outshot the Corsairs, 20-6, forcing UMD junior keeper Kat Hubbard to make ten saves. Eastern senior keeper Alexis Tyrrell (Torrington) and sophomore Emily Wallace (Smithtown, NY) needed only one combined save to  guarantee Eastern's sixth shutout of the year, second straight. The shutout loss was UMD's 11^th in a row.