OPENING TIP
- Lafayette will try to be the first team in Patriot League play this season to knock off Bucknell at Sojka Pavilion when it travels to Lewisburg on Sunday afternoon. Bucknell enters at 17-10 overall and 11-4 in Patriot League play, having already secured a top-four spot in the Patriot League Tournament.

- The Leopards look to extend their win streak to six games on Sunday, having gone 5-1 since the beginning of February, their first winning month this season. 

- Sophomore Justin Jaworski has gone 44 straight games with a three, the second-longest streak in the nation. Jaworski moved up to second in the country this week in three-point percentage, knocking down shots from distance at a 48.7 percent clip.

- Senior co-captain Paulius Zalys used a team-high 19 points in the win over American on Wednesday to become the 45th player in program history to reach the 1,000-point milestone.

ZALYS HITS 1,000
Senior co-captain Paulius Zalys has bounced back from a slow non-conference stretch to excel since the beginning of December in his senior campaign, averaging 11.0 points, 4.9 rebounds and 3.6 assists in Patriot League contests. Due to his recent form, the Kaunas, Lithuanian native used 19 points the last time out to become Lafayette's 45th 1,000-point scorer in program history.

LAST TIME OUT
Sophomore Alex Petrie's falling-away driving layup from the right block with three seconds to play proved the difference in the fifth straight victory for the Leopards on Wednesday night at Kirby Sports Center, defeating American by a final of 70-68.

The game started as a marquee night for senior co-captain Paulius Zalys, reaching his 1,000-point milestone early in the second half. But it ended with a victory in large part due to the play of Petrie down the stretch, who scored the Leopards' final seven points in the last three minutes to move Lafayette to 7-8 in conference play and 10-16 overall.

With less than two minutes to play and American up five, Petrie's jumper made it a three-point game at 68-65. The defense got yet another stop, allowing just two points in the final three minutes of action, setting up Petrie's finish through a foul with the free throw tying it at 68-68.

On the ensuing possession, American's Sa'eed Nelson, the Patriot League Preseason Player of the Year and second in the league in scoring at 19.3 points per game, drew a foul and went to the line for 1-and-1 to potentially take the lead into the final seconds. Instead, he missed the front end, setting up Petrie's heroics to win it.

Zalys led the Leopards offensively on his milestone night, finishing with 19 points on 8-of-14 from the field and 2-of-3 from beyond the arc. Petrie added 14, while classmate Justin Jaworski and junior Lukas Jarrett chipped in with 13 and 11, respectively.

Lafayette uncharacteristically did the majority of its work from the paint, scoring 40 of its 70 points from inside. The Leopards went just 5-of-18 from three-point range (27.8%), but hit 26-of-58 overall (44.8%) and converted from the charity stripe 13-of-15 times (86.7%).

THE SKINNY ON THE BISON
Bucknell, having secured a top-four seed in the Patriot League Tournament in the past week, enters Sunday's contest off a season-high two-game skid, falling on the road at Holy Cross (72-71) and Colgate (75-64) to move to 11-4 in conference play and 17-10 overall. The Bison, picked to finish second in the Patriot League Preseason Poll, still sit atop the Patriot League standings, though, entering the final three games of the regular-season slate.

The Bison get the majority of their scoring from two sources in Kimbal Mackenzie and Nate Sestina. Mackenzie averages 17.0 points per outing, while Sestina puts up 16.2 points per night and adds 7.9 boards per game to pace Bucknell on the glass. Prior to its two-game losing streak, Bucknell had won its previous five and has not lost a Patriot League game at home this season.

LAST MEETING
Lafayette couldn't get much going offensively and Bucknell made the Leopards pay on Feb. 2 at Kirby Sports Center, as the Leopards dropped a 94-66 contest.

Sophomores Alex Petrie and Justin Jaworski netted 16 and 12 points, respectively, as Lafayette's top offensive threats on Saturday, while senior co-captain Paulius Zalys added 11. Bucknell's Kimbal Mackenzie led all scorers with 31 points, including 14 from the foul line.

The Leopards struggled offensively to the tune of a field-goal percentage at 34.3 percent (24-of-70) and went just 7-of-28 from beyond the three-point line (25.0%). Bucknell shot just under 50 percent for the contest (49.3%) and carried a 48-38 edge on the glass.

ROLLING PARDS
With the victory over American on Wednesday, the Leopards moved their current win streak to five straight games, the longest for the Maroon and White since the 2012-13 season. Three of those five wins have come on the road at Boston U., Navy and Loyola, with the other two at home against Holy Cross and American. In 2012-13, the Leopards rattled off seven consecutive victories, with a pair in postseason play.

BREAKING TRENDS
Lafayette's win over Holy Cross on Feb. 10 broke a number of trends working against the Leopards this season. It was the first of two wins when scoring less than 70 points this season and the first of two occasions when shooting a field-goal percentage fewer than its opponent, the other coming the last time out versus American. 

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. Against American, Lafayette went 44.8 percent from the field compared to 50.0 percent for the Eagles, but Petrie's winner with 3.3 seconds left on the clock decided it.

Other stats of note include the Holy Cross victory being just the second of three times this season the Leopards put five players in double-figure scoring, and it gave Lafayette its first winning month this season, now sitting at 5-1 in February.