Box Score
WILLIMANTIC, Conn. – The Keene State College women's basketball team used a strong second quarter to ease to a 78-62 Little East Conference victory over Eastern Connecticut State University Wednesday evening at Geissler Gymnasium.

 A winner of only half of its games last year, Keene (17-7, 11-4 LEC) remains locked into third place in the conference standings, while Eastern (8-16, 5-10 LEC) sits at sixth place on the back of its five-game losing streak. Southern Maine and Rhode Island College will claim the two byes in the conference tournament according the top two finishers in the nine-game standings, each earning an automatic trip to LEC tournament semifinals. As only six teams will qualify for the tournament, Eastern and Western Connecticut State University will fight for the sixth and final spot.

The Warriors host Plymouth State University (10-14, 3-12 LEC) in their final match of the regular season on Saturday at 3 p.m. The Panthers, who cannot qualify for the LEC tournament, are on a three-game losing streak, having lost at home to VTSU Castleton, 83-65, Wednesday evening. WestConn (9-15, 4-11 LEC) faces UMass Dartmouth (10-14, 7-8 LEC) in Danbury at 1 p.m. on Saturday, having lost, 69-56 at UMass Dartmouth five weeks ago.
Eastern has lost five straight and eight of nine while Keene won for the sixth time in its last eight games.

Unofficially, the Warriors will claim the sixth and final seed with a win on Saturday or a Western Connecticut loss on Saturday. If Eastern loses and Western wins, Western will advance on a tiebreaker. Either Eastern or Western will face Keene State in the first round of the conference tournament, a game to be played in Keene, NH.

In Wednesday night's matchup against Keene, the fullcourt defensive pressure applied throughout by the Owls proved to be too much for the Warriors, who kept pace for certain moments in the game. Head coach Mandy King was forced to make two changes to her starting lineup, with Katelyn Novak (Colchester) and Alyssa Paquette (Claremont, NH) both unavailable for the Warriors. Novak was a starter in all 23 of Eastern's games before tonight, while Paquette also played in all 23, starting 19. Nevaeh King (Brockton, MA) and Isabella Romero (Peabody, MA) both made their fifth starts of the season tonight. A regular starter, first-year player Maddie Topa (New Hartford) provided a bulk of the scoring for the Warriors. Topa led Eastern in scoring in each of the first three quarters, finishing on 20 points with efficient 8-13 shooting from the field. First-year sophomore Trinity Angel (Killingly) had an impressive third quarter, scoring on all three of her attempts and grabbing a couple rebounds, tying Topa in the points category in the third.

While the entire team showed defense aggression throughout the game, Brynn Rautiola and Ruby Dasaro were the standouts offensively for Keene. The pair combined for seven of Keene's 14 steals and 43 points on a combined 16-of-22 shooting from the field, including Rautiola's 6-of-9 from long range. Marissa Nudd (Colchester) and Liv Cassesse (Wallingford) both had difficult nights, hitting just five of their combined 21 attempts from the floor.

Down by 23 points halfway through the fourth quarter, the Warriors found a late push through Morgan Yonush (Plainfield), who had four steals in less than a minute and a half. Cassesse started the 10-0 run with a three-pointer and first-year player Juliana Conte (Wakefield, MA) scored five points before Keene was forced to call a timeout. With 2:54 remaining and the Owl lead down to 13, Keene elected to put all of its starters back into the game and was able to hang on to their double-digit lead and sweep the Warriors for the first time in the regular season since joining the LEC in 1997/98.