WILLIMANTIC, Conn. 2/8/11 – Eastern Conn. State junior forward Piper Chapman (Portsmouth, R.I.) scored 23 of the Warriors 50 points and pulled down 11 rebounds to lead the Warriors 50-42 over the Keene State College Owls on Tuesday night at the Francis E. Geissler Gymnasium.

The Owls, who have dropped seven of their last eight contests to the Warriors fall to 10-12 on the year and 3-8 in the Little East Conference, while the win improves Eastern Conn. to 16-6 and 9-2 in league action.

Leading the Owls, Junior Courtney Cirillo (Windsor Locks, Conn.) had 15 points and nine rebounds for a near double-double. Junior Meghan Farrell (Chester, Vermont) pulled down a team-high 10 rebounds and junior Sara Laudano (North Haven, Conn.) played 39-of-40 minutes and netted 10 points.

In the first half, the Owls had the lead as high as seven points on three separate occasions. Jumping out to a seven point lead to start the game capped by a Cirillo free throw just over five minutes into the game. Freshman guard Ashlee Moussette (Southampton, Mass.) hit a jumper at the 9:15 mark to give the Owls a 13-6 lead and less than a minute later Laudano's jump-shot gave KSC a 15-8 advantage.

The Warriors closed the first half on a 13-4 run, with Chapman's layup with seven seconds remaining gave Eastern Conn. their first lead of the game at 21-19.

Eastern Conn. extended their lead to as many as 10 points in the second half. Champman's bucket  with 13:06 remaining gave the Warriors a 37-27 lead.

KSC cut the lead to three on a jumper from Cirillo with eight minutes left to make it 41-38.

But that is as close as the Owls would get, as senior Amanda Pierlioni (Plainville, Conn.) and Chapman would each hit one-of-two free throws down the stretch to ice the game and give the Warriors a 50-42 victory.

Both team shot poorly from three-point range, with KSC missing all 15 of their attempts, while the Warriors made four-of-21 (19%). Both teams shot just over 30 percent from the field, with Eastern shooting 19-of-58 (32.8%) and the Owls shooting 17-of-56 (30.4%) in the game.

The Owls return home for their final home game of the season on Saturday as they will take on Western Conn. State at 1 p.m. at Spaulding Gymnasium.