NORTH DARTMOUTH, Mass. – Senior Grace Bazin finished with two goals and one assist, scoring twice in a seven-minute span early to help the Keene State College field hockey team erase an early deficit as the Owls went on to a 4-2 Little East Conference victory over the University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth on Friday night.

KSC (7-1, 1-0 LEC) rebounded from a road loss on Wednesday night in what was mostly a comfortable win, as they scored twice in the second quarter to assume a 3-1 halftime lead and made it a three-goal advantage five minutes into the second half while beating the Corsairs (1-7, 0-1 LEC) for the eighth straight time.  UMass-Dartmouth lost their sixth straight and remained winless (0-4) at home, getting outscored 16-4.

The Owls' first deficit against the Corsairs in eight years, since their last loss in the series, as Bazin corralled a rebound right in front of the cage and beat UMD goalkeeper Shane Cueman to her left.  The Owl senior and Division III leading scorer then ensured her sixth multi-goal effort of the season in eight tries five minutes into the second quarter, tipping home a Meghan Daileanes centering feed for a 2-1 KSC lead.  Daileanes then capitalized off a rebound that hit the post with 2:31 to go until halftime to give the Owls a 3-1 edge, which was never threatened from there.  KSC outshot the Corsairs 16-6 in the opening 30 minutes and 28-9 overall (22-6 on goal).  The Owls also had nine of 13 penalty corners, though were held off the board on those opportunities.

Cueman made a save on a shot by Belle Hemond just a minute out of the locker room to keep it a two-goal game, and stopped her again two minutes later, but the Owls eventually broke through when Bazin fed Grace Seabury up the left side, who spun and beat her defender to pot her fourth goal of the season five minutes into the third.  Kelly Bates gave UMD their highest goal total at home this season by answering with a goal of her own 2:37 later, but the Corsairs were then held shotless over the final 22:23.

"It was a hard-fought game by both teams," said KSC head coach Amy Watson.  "We went with a couple different formations tonight, which highlighted some flexibility in our roster."

Bazin has 36 points on the season thus far, 14 away from a top 10 KSC single-season total.  She finished with 59 (26 goals, seven assists) a season ago, good for fourth on the list.  Sami Smith '17 is the all-time single-season points leader with 85 in 2016 (36 goals, 13 assists), a year in which the Owls finished 21-4 including a win over Williams College and reached the second round of the NCAA tournament.

Clara Gorman made four saves in the cage for KSC.  Cueman stood on her head for UMD, making a whopping 18 saves to keep her team somewhat within reach.  It was, somewhat remarkably, the lowest goal total for KSC in a game against the Corsairs since the 2-0 loss in 2017 – they had scored 54 goals in the last seven meetings entering tonight (7.7 per game).

Keene State visits Smith College (3-3) on Tuesday night (September 23) at 6:00 p.m.