GORHAM, Maine – Junior Conor Berto (Lake Forest, Ill.) had a goal and two assists to lead the visiting Babson College Beavers to a 5-1 victory over the University of Southern Maine Huskies in a rescheduled ECAC Men's East game Monday afternoon at the USM Ice Arena.

            The win gave the Beavers a sweep of their rescheduled trip to Maine following the blizzard that hit the New England region on Friday and Saturday.  The Beavers, who beat the University of New England on Sunday, improved to 13-6-4 overall and 9-5-2 in league play.

            The Huskies, who snapped an eight-game losing streak with their 6-3 win over #9 University of Massachusetts Boston on Sunday, fall to 7-16-0 overall and 4-12-0 in the league.

            Babson built a 3-0 lead in the opening period before USM got on the board in the final seconds of the period.  Babson put the game away with a pair of goals in a span of 24 seconds in the latter stages of the second period, and then used a stingy defense and the strong goaltending of senior Zeke Testa (Wellesley, Mass.) to stifle USM.

            Berto set up classmate Matt O'Neill (Norwell, Mass.) for a goal from a bad angle to the left of the USM goal at the 5:00 mark of the opening period.  Senior Ryan Smith (Lynnfield, Mass.) potted the rebound of his own shot that struck the post to make it 2-0 at 12:35.  Senior PT Donato (Arlington, Mass.), set up by Berto and O'Neill, increased the margin to 3-0 with a shot from the right wing circle that eluded USM rookie goalie Josh Hillegas (Middleton, Wis.) with 38 seconds remaining.

            Southern Maine, which rang the iron twice in the opening minutes of the period, finally got on the board when freshman Alex Pompeo (Hingham, Mass.) found the net behind Testa with 11 seconds left in the first period.  Junior Troy Thibodeau (Danvers, Mass.) and sophomore Sam Guimond (Portland, Maine) drew the assists.

            Sophomore Joe DiPietro (Pembroke, Mass.) scored his first goal of the season at 13:14 of the second period, and Berto lit the lamp with his team-leading 15th goal of the season 24 ticks later to make it 5-1.

            Testa stopped 27 shots to pick up his fifth win of the season.  Hillegas played the opening two periods and made nine saves.  Freshman Patrick Farrington (Sandwich, Mass.) played the final period and stopped all seven shots he faced.

            For the Beavers, senior Matt Leer (Edina, Minn.) picked up a pair of assists.

            Southern Maine will finish the regular season this weekend with road games at Saint Anselm College on Friday (4:00 p.m.) and New England College on Saturday (4:30 p.m.).  Babson closes the regular season hosting league leader and #1 ranked Norwich University on Friday (7:00 p.m.) and Saint Michael's College on Saturday (4:00 p.m.).