KEENE, N.H. – The Eastern Connecticut State University men's lacrosse team shut out Keene State College for nearly 40 minutes, scoring 12 consecutive goals in the middle two quarters en route to a 14-10 Little East Conference victory in a first-place battle Saturday afternoon at Owl Stadium Complex.

The win for Eastern (7-3, 3-0 little east) over Keene State (4-3, 2-1 little east) on the Owls' field is its first after four straight losses dating back to 2005. The Warriors (five titles) and Keene (two) have combined to win seven of eight LEC playoff titles.

While Eastern seniors DJ Simmons (Mystic) and Matthew Savage (Southington) were combining for ten goals, the Warriors' defense was limiting Keene point leaders Griffin Meehan and Tony Santa Fe to a combined one goal and two assists. Santa Fe, last year's conference Offensive Player-of-the-Year, was shut out.

Keene scored half of its goal total in a span of six minutes in the first quarter before the Warriors reeled off 12 straight goals. Eastern did not allow a goal for 38:45, a stretch which gave them a 13-5 lead heading into the final 15-minute quarter.

Simmons and Savage each recorded their 100th career goal in the match, making them the 9th and 10th players in program history to reach that plateau. Simmons totaled career-highs with six goals and seven points, while Savage had four goals.

Simmons scored three goals in three minutes, the third one giving the Warriors their first lead, 6-5, six minutes into the second quarter. Eastern led 8-5 at halftime, but neither club was able to break through over the first six minutes of the second half. Simmons broke the standoff with an extra-man goal at that point, and Matthew Savage followed with three in a row over four minutes to push Eastern'e lead to seven, 12-5, with four minutes left in the third perid.

"At halftime, we told them that the first seven minutes of the second half would be critical," said second-year Eastern head coach Justin Axel. "We said that if we scored a couple of quick ones, instead of it being 8-5, it would be 10-5, and it would really be an uphill battle for (Keene)."

Keene scored five of the game's final six goals, but two came inside the final two-plus minutes.

Eastern senior defenseman Steve Lane (Groton) marked Santa Fe tightly throughout most of the game and also came up with a career-tying eight ground balls.

Axel praised the offensive play of Simmons ("Keene had no answer for him") and the defensive performance of Lane, as well as the overall execution of the penalty-killing unit. The win was the second in as many tries under Axel for Eastern, which survived a triple-overtime 11-10 decision a year ago at Eastern.

Senior goalie Kyle Savage (Southington) made 17 saves – his second-highest total of the season behind the 19 he collected against defending national champion Salisbury University March 21. Eleven of his saves came when he shut out the hosts through the middle two periods. The win leaves Savage one shy of the career record for goalies, set by Mark Hayes earlier this decade.

After killing off 11 of its opponents' 14 extra-man opportunies earlier this week against Trinity College, Eastern's man-down unit blanked Keene on five tries after the Owls converted their first man-up try four minutes into the match. Eastern capitalized on three of its six extra-man opportunies, with Simmons and junior midfielder Zach Malouf (Norwich) scoring back-to-back extra-man goals that began the 12-0 scoring run.

For the first time in eight years of conference playoff competition last year, the championship match did not include Eastern or Keene or both. Both clubs were upset in the semifinals of the tournament, won for the first time by Western Connecticut. Last year's regular-season champion, Eastern was rated No. 1 in this year's pre-season coaches' poll and was followed closely in the balloting by Keene.

Eastern visits Massachusetts Dartmouth in a Little East Conference match Tuesday at 4:00 p.m.

2009-04-11