OPENING TIP
- The Leopards look to extend their season-long win streak to three on Wednesday night in Annapolis, Maryland, battling Navy. The Mids took the first meeting this season in Easton by an 85-77 score on Jan. 16.

- Sophomore Alex Petrie's 21 points in the Leopards' trip to Annapolis last year put him at 394 on his rookie season, breaking the program's rookie single-season scoring record. Petrie went on to finish his freshman season with 466 points, an average of 15.0 per night.
- Senior Paulius Zalys is bidding to become the 45th player in Lafayette history to reach the 1,000-point mark for his career. Zalys currently sits at 964 career points.

- The Leopards have an even split remaining in the league schedule with three on the road and three at home to precede the Patriot League Tournament, beginning on March 5.

LAST TIME OUT
Lafayette found itself battling adversity once again at Kirby Sports Center on Sunday afternoon, but the Leopards showed resiliency as free throws with less than five seconds to play proved to be the difference in a 69-67 victory over Holy Cross.

Lafayette controlled the opening half and went into the break with a 47-35 advantage, but Holy Cross quickly closed the gap and led by a bucket midway through the second stanza. Despite squandering the advantage, the Leopards continued to fight and ultimately hung on as sophomore Justin Jaworski drilled two foul shots with five seconds left to seal it.

Jaworski finished with a game-high 18 points on the afternoon, one of five Leopards to record a double-figuring scoring line. Classmate Alex Petrie added 13, while junior Lukas Jarrett, sophomore E.J. Stephens and freshman Isaac Suffren chipped in with 12, 11 and 10 points, respectively.

The Leopards put their three-point shooting on display, scoring 42 of their 62 points from beyond the arc. Lafayette went 14-of-29 from distance on the day (48.3%), including Petrie's 4-of-6 mark, 3-of-7 from Jaworski and two makes each from Jarrett, Stephens and Suffren.

The win is the second straight for the Maroon and White, the first back-to-back wins of the 2018-19 campaign. The Leopards improved to 7-16 overall and 4-8 in Patriot League action, while Holy Cross fell to 13-12, sitting at 4-8 in conference play.

THE SKINNY ON THE MIDS
Navy enters Wednesday's contest off wins in two of its last three in Patriot League play to move to 8-15 on the year overall and 5-7 in conference action. Both of the Mids' wins in February came at Alumni Hall, a 71-68 victory over Loyola and a 77-67 win against American. In the last time out, Navy traveled to Bethlehem, Pa. and dropped an 83-57 game at the hands of Lehigh.

George Kiernan and Hasan Abdullah are the lone Navy players to average in double-figure scoring with 12.4 and 10.5 points per night, respectively. Cam Davis, Evan Wieck and John Carter Jr. each add 9.7, 7.8 and 7.4 points each per night. The Mids rebound by committee with Kiernan's 5.2 boards per game one of four different players that average more than four rebounds per contest, leading to a +2.8 rebounding margin on the year as a team.

LAST MEETING
Lafayette went into the break with a two-point edge on Jan. 16 at Kirby Sports Center, but Navy came out a different team, scoring 53 points in the second 20 minutes to down the Leopards by a score of 85-77.

Cold stretches were the downfall for the Leopards as they went more than four minutes without a bucket midway through the second half, allowing Navy's lead to stretch to seven and putting the Mids in control to the final stretch. After shooting 40.7 percent from the field in the opening half, Navy improved to 57.1 percent in the second 20 minutes, making 16 of its 28 shoots, including 5-of-9 from three-point range in the second stanza.

Lafayette went 27-for-61 overall (44.3%) and 10-of-28 from three-point range (35.7%), but made just 4-of-13 from distance in the second half. Sophomore Justin Jaworski led all scorers with 20 points on 4-of-8 from beyond the arc, while senior co-captain Paulius Zalys and sophomore Alex Petrie chipped in with 17 and 15 points, respectively.

BREAKING TRENDS
Lafayette's win over Holy Cross on Sunday broke a number of trends working against the Leopards this season. It was the first win when scoring less than 70 points this season and the first when shooting a field-goal percentage fewer than its opponent. Holy Cross shot 49.1 percent from the field compared to just 40.4 percent from the Maroon and White, but a 48.3 percent mark from distance for the Leopards proved to cancel that out. Other stats of note include the Holy Cross victory being just
the second time this season the Leopards put five players in double-figure scoring, and it gave Lafayette its first winning month this season, sitting at 2-1 in February.

THE POLISH RIFLE
Sophomore Justin Jaworski has been on a tear from the three-point line in recent games, moving up to fourth in the nation in three-point percentage at 48.2 percent for the year. Over his last 12 outings, Jaworski has gone 39-for-70 from distance
(55.7%). At that percentage, it's only fitting that Jaworski is second in the Patriot League in three's made per game as well, knocking down 2.9 per contest.