BABSON PARK, Mass.—Juniors Michael Phillips (Richmond Heights, Ohio) and Bill Seligman (Toronto, Ontario) each scored once as No. 8 USCHO.com/No. 9 D3hockey.com Babson College played to a 2-2 overtime tie against visiting New England College in New England Hockey Conference (NEHC) action on Saturday afternoon at the Babson Skating Center.

Babson, which entered the day having won six of its last seven games, wraps up the regular season at 17-5-3 overall and 13-3-2 in league play, while New England College finishes at 11-8-6 overall and 6-6-6 in the NEHC. The Beavers will be the second seed in the conference tournament, which begins next Saturday, while the Pilgrims locked up the fifth seed.

Seniors Mike Vollmin (Wilmington, N.C.) and Max Franklin (Wrentham, Mass.), and sophomore Ryan Gouveia (Dartmouth, Mass.) all recorded one assist for the Green and White. Senior Jamie Murray (Scituate, Mass.) turned away 23 shots and is now 12-4-3 on the year.

First-years Connor Fries (Barnstable, Mass.) and Mike Whitehair (Victor, N.Y.) each scored once for New England College, which got 41 saves from junior netminder Brett Kilar (Coto de Caza, Calif.).

Both teams killed off penalties in the opening 12 minutes of the contest, and Phillips put Babson on top 1-0 with his third tally of the year at the 13:08 mark. Vollmin cleared the puck to Franklin in the neutral zone and he found a streaking Phillips, who beat Kilar on his blocker side for the opening goal of the game.

The Pilgrims evened the score late in the first though, as Fries notched his seventh goal of the season just 36 seconds before the intermission. First-year Andreas Zollner (Varnamo, Sweden) lifted his centering pass from the left wing and Fries batted it out of the air and past Murray to make it 1-1.

New England College junior Chris Santello (Fairfield, Conn.) hit the post at 8:46 of the second period and Kilar made 12 saves to send the game deadlocked to the third, where both teams took advantage of strange bounces by the puck. Seligman put the Beavers back in front 2-1 when he threw the puck on net and saw it bounce past Kilar at the 4:30 mark. The Pilgrims tied it again less than five minutes later though, as Whitehair was credited with his sixth tally of the year after the puck took an unexpected bounce off the boards and deflected in to make it 2-2 with a little more than 10 minutes to play.

Murray, who stopped 20 shots over the final two periods and overtime, including a shoulder-stop of a blast by Whitehair with just 17 seconds left in the extra session to preserve one point.

The Green and White finished with a 45-34 edge at the face-off dot, while the squads combined to go 0-for-5 on the power play.

Both teams will open NEHC Tournament play with quarterfinal contests next Saturday. Babson will host seventh-seeded Skidmore at 7 p.m., while New England College will travel to fourth-seeded University of New England.

GAME NOTES
• The Beavers are 38-18-6 all-time against NEC and are unbeaten in 10 straight games (5-0-5) against the Pilgrims going back to 2011.
• Babson is now 16-0-2 on the year when scoring first.
• The Green and White is 17-2-3 this season when they are leading or tied entering the third period.
• Saturday's contest marked the final regular-season home game for Franklin, Murray, Vollmin and fellow seniors Jimmy Magrath, Phil Saviuk and Jared Wiedemann. This group helped the Beavers to a record of 76-23-13, as well as back-to-back conference tournament championships and NCAA Division III Tournament Quarterfinal appearances in 2013 and 2014.