Niagara, N.Y. - In the final regular season contest of the 2009-10 campaign, the Robert Morris University men's hockey team closed out a two-game, home-and-home series against Niagara University in Dwyer Arena.  The Colonials struggled to shut down the Purple Eagles offense has they took an early, 3-0, lead in route to a 4-2 victory on Saturday night.

With the loss, Robert Morris concludes the season with a 10-18-5 overall record and a second place, 6-9-3 record, in conference play.

Niagara took a two goal lead midway through the first period thanks to markers from Tyler Gotto and Giancarlo Iuorio.  Gotto notched his power play score at the 10:16 mark while Iuorio tallied his fifth of the year at 16:32.

Shots at the end of one were 13-7 in favor of Niagara.

Seven minutes into the second, the Purple Eagles tacked on a third goal at even strength from Egor Mironov.  After the third NU goal, Robert Morris starting goaltender, Brooks Ostergard (Chagrin Falls, Ohio / Bay State Breakers) was replaced in net by freshman Eric Levine (Wheeling, Ill. / Pembroke Lumber Kings).

The Colonials finally managed to get on the board when freshman Stefan Salituro (Willodale, Ontario / Mahoning Valley Phantoms) netted an unassisted goal at 10:18 of the second period to bring RMU back within two.

With a 3-1 lead, and a 25-21 advantage on shots at the end of two, Niagara's Mironov started off the final period with a tally on the man-advantage at 5:29.

Despite being down by a trio of goals, Salituro recorded his second of the contest for his first career power play goal.  Helpers on the RMU goal were awarded to Ron Cramer (New Wilmington, Pa. / Indiana Ice) and Trevor Lewis (Lititz, Pa. / Syracuse Stars).

Ostergard was credited with the 4-2 loss as he made 15 saves in the first 27 minutes of action.  Levine stopped an additional 16 shots in his 30 minutes of work between the pipes.

Although the Colonials slipped in their two final conference contests, the squad will head into the 2010 CHA Tournament as the second seed.  #2 Robert Morris will meet #3 Alabama-Huntsville in the opening semi-final match up on Friday afternoon at 3 p.m. at Dwyer Arena.  The winner will move onto Saturday's CHA Championship game against either #1Bemidji State or #4 Niagara.  The championship bout is scheduled for 8 p.m. and will be nationally broadcast on CBS College Sports.