EASTON, Pa. – Colgate showcased a strong performance from start to finish Wednesday night to match a program record 11 Patriot League wins.
 
The Raiders took down Lafayette 95-83 for Colgate's highest scoring night of the season. With the victory Colgate shifts to 11-6 in conference play, tying the Patriot League championship team from 1995 (11-3) for most wins in school history.
 
Also with the outcome, Colgate secured no worse than the No. 2 seed in the Patriot League Tournament. The Raiders are not satisfied with that though as home-court advantage throughout the entire tournament is still within reach.
 
The scenario comes down to this: with a win on Saturday against Lehigh and a Bucknell loss at American, Colgate ties the Bison for the regular season title. And since the Raiders took both games against Bucknell during the regular season, the Raiders would have hosting rights throughout the tournament.
 
In Wednesday's game, Lafayette jumped out to a 3-2 edge following a trey from Bryce Scott just one minute in. The Raiders answered with a 3-pointer on the other end of court and ultimately never looked back.
 
Lafayette pulled to within 7-5 but a Damon Sherman-Newsome jumper sparked a 15-2 Raider run over nearly eight minutes. Colgate over that stretch kept the Leopards scoreless from floor, conceding just two free throws, to make it 22-7 midway through the half.
 
Lafayette cut the lead to 36-32 with three seconds remaining but a halfcourt buzzer-beater from Austin Tillotson gave the Raiders a seven-point lead at the break.
 
It was a 41-36 Colgate advantage a minute into the second period but that would be as close as the Leopards would come. The Raiders held a double-digit lead for almost the entire second half.
 
Sherman-Newsome recorded his first 20-plus scoring night in seven weeks with a team-high 28 points. He is now just eight points shy of reaching 1,000 career points in his three years at Colgate.
 
Senior Luke Roh chipped in 21 points on perfect shooting, going 9-for-9 from the floor and 3-for-3 from the free throw line. He was one bucket away from matching the Patriot League record for best field goal percentage in a game, which sits at 10-for-10 and has been done twice. Roh's numbers almost match teammate Ethan Jacobs' marks from way back on Dec. 31, when the Tipton, Indiana, native went 9-for-9 from the floor, 4-for-4 from downtown and 2-for-2 from the free throw line in a win at Lehigh.
 
Jacobs and Tillotson also posted double-figures in the game with 15 and 14 points, respectively. Tillotson joined Roh and went a perfect 3-for-3 overall, 2-for-2 from 3-point range and 6-for-6 from the charity stripe.
 
On the boards it was Matt McMullen who pulled down a team-best seven rebounds. Both McMullen and Jacobs led the team with four assists each, while Jacobs added three boards to match his career-high.
 
On the night, Colgate shot a season-best 66 percent from the floor and hit 8-of-17 from long-range. The Raiders also converted on 21 of their 24 shots from the charity stripe. The Leopards finished the game shooting 50.9 percent overall and hit 9-of-20 from downtown.
 
The Raiders wrap up their regular season schedule at home on Saturday when they welcome Lehigh at noon. That game is scheduled to be broadcast live on CBS Sports Network and will be the Raiders annual Alzheimer's Awareness Game and Senior Day.
 
Bottom Line
• Colgate 95, Lafayette 83
• The Raiders put up their highest scoring total of the season and the second-highest in the Matt Langel era. Colgate defeated Tulane 98-86 last season for the most points scored under Langel.
 
Won-Lost Records
• Colgate improves to 14-16 overall and 11-6 in Patriot League play.
• Lafayette shifts to 16-12 and 8-9, respectively.
• With Wednesday's victory and Bucknell's loss at Lehigh, Colgate still has a chance to secure the overall No. 1 seed in the Patriot League Tournament.
• If American can defeat Bucknell at home Saturday and Colgate can pull out a win against Lehigh, the Raiders would share the regular season title with the Bison and hold the head-to-head advantage. Colgate took both games against Bucknell earlier in the year.
 
Facts & Figures
• Sherman-Newsome led the Raiders with a team-high 28 points on 9-of-13 shooting from the floor, 3-of-6 makes from behind the arc and 7-of-9 good free throws.
• He has now reached double-figure scoring in a team-best 25 of Colgate's 30 games so far this season.
• Roh went perfect from the floor for the third time this season. The Scottsdale, Arizona, native finished Wednesday's game 9-of-9 overall and 3-for-3 from the free throw line. He was also perfect against Holy Cross (5-for-5) and Boston U. (5-for-5) in the Raiders' first go around with those teams.
• The senior added five rebounds, three assists and two steals during his 35 minutes of action.
• Jacobs chipped in 15 points of his own on 6-of-9 shooting, while matching his career-best in assists with four and in steals with three.
• The Tipton, Indiana, native is currently riding a five-game double-figure scoring streak heading into Saturday's contest.
• Tillotson also went perfect from the floor going 3-for-3, 2-for-2 from long-range and 6-for-6 from the charity stripe to close out the Raider players in double-digits with 14 points.
• He added two assists and three steals during his time on the court.  
• On the night, Colgate shot a season-high 66 percent overall and added 8-of-17 makes from 3-point range. The Raiders also converted on 21 of their 24 shots from the free throw line for 87.5 percent shooting.
• The Leopards slightly outrebounded the Raiders at 28-22 and had an impressive 11 offensive boards.
• Colgate notched 40 points from inside the paint compared to Lafayette's 26. The Raiders also registered the edge on points from turnovers at 20-6.  
• There were no tie scores and two lead changes throughout the game.
• The Raiders held the advantage for 38:57, while Lafayette was ahead for 00:28.
• Colgate earned a game-high 16-point lead after John Fenton finished off a hard layup with five minutes remaining in the opening half. The Raiders held the 32-16 edge following that bucket.
 
Lafayette's Numbers
• The Leopards saw sophomore Nick Lindner go for a game and career-high 30 points. He added a game-high six helpers as well during his 31 minutes of action.
• Dan Trist and Bryce Scott closed out the Lafayette players with double-digits with 19 and 13 points, respectively, in the game.
• On the boards Scott pulled down a team-best seven rebounds, including three on the offensive glass.
• The Leopards shots 50.9 percent from the floor and hit 9-of-20 from deep. They also went 20-for-28 from the charity stripe to finish the night shooting 71.4 percent from the line.   

Interesting Notes
• Colgate achieved something on Wednesday it has done only once in its 24-year history in the Patriot League. The Raiders grabbed 11 conference wins, tying only the championship team from 1995 for the most conference wins in school history.
• The Raiders scored a season-high 95 points. It's the second-most points scored in a game during the Langel era.  
• The Raiders put up a season-best 56 points in the second half alone.
• Colgate finished Wednesday night shooting a season-high 66 percent from the floor.
• Lafayette's 83 points were the most given up by the Raiders all season, beating Loyola's 80 points scored in triple overtime during Colgate's last outing on Sunday.
• Four Colgate players recorded double-figures in a game for the 13th time this season and fourth-straight contest.
• Colgate is still within reach of earning its first regular season title in more than two decades. The Raiders have to beat Lehigh at home on Saturday and get a little help from American, which needs to take down Bucknell at home, in order for the Bison and Raiders to be co-regular season champions. If that outcome happens, the Raiders secure the No. 1 overall seed in the tournament, having defeated Bucknell, twice, earlier in the season.

How It Happened
• Colgate opened the scoring hitting the first bucket of the game 32 seconds in.
• The Leopards responded with a trey on their first possession to hand them their only lead in the game at 3-2.
• The Raiders then saw Sherman-Newsome answer with a 3-pointer of his own which ultimately gave Colgate the lead for good.  
• Trist pulled Lafayette to within 7-5 but a 15-2 run over nearly eight minutes awarded Colgate a comfortable 22-7 edge with 12 minutes remaining in the first half. During that run, the Raiders kept the Leopards scoreless from the floor, conceding only two free throws.
• Lafayette cut the margin to 36-34 with three seconds left in the half but a half court buzzer-beater from Tillotson gave the Raiders the seven-point lead heading into the break.
• Midway through the second half Colgate held the 61-53 advantage and held a double-digit lead for much of the remaining minutes.
• The Raiders finished the game from the free throw line and secured themselves a 12-point victory to split the regular season series with the Leopards.
 
Records Watch
• Sherman-Newsome and Moore are still in the hunt for reaching 1,000 career points. Sherman-Newsome is eight points shy, while Moore sits at 84 short.
• Moore hit his 186 career 3-pointer on Wednesday, which allowed him to pass Jon Simon '07 for fifth place all-time.
• Tillotson recorded two assists in the game, which handed him 121 on the season. The junior is now just 12 helpers shy of matching his total from a season ago, which placed him third all-time in season-assists.
• Roh registered three assists in the contest as well and sits with 336 career helpers. He is now just 20 assists shy of matching Dave Hardy '03 for third all-time.

Straight From The Source
• Colgate head coach Matt Langel: (on his overall thoughts from the game) "We needed to play well, which was most important for me."
 
"They are a hard team to try and prepare for. (Dan) Trist really hurt us the first go around and tonight (Nick) Lindner goes off. You would think for two teams that have pretty efficient offenses and have a lot of weapons, they would play a game like this, much more so than a game like the first go around up in Hamilton. But that's college basketball and the beauty of the game. You never know what's going to happen. The identity and personality of each game is going to be different."
 
"Despite our really good start, our guys got a little frazzled when we got into foul trouble and that's a big lesson for us toward the end of the season."
 
"Our guys have put us in position to be, now at the worst second place in a really competitive league, and that's what they need to believe in and trust. That needs to be our identity as a team through good and bad. There are going to be bumps in the post season with ups and downs and you've got to persevere and shorten those bad stretches and lengthen your long stretches, which ultimately I thought we were able to do."
 
"It's no secret we've given away some leads late in games and for us to hang onto that lead and step up and make our free throws, we turned it over just once or twice, which maybe isn't bad for us, but that last three or four minutes seemed to take an eternity for me. I know that was Coach (Fran) O'Hanlon's plan to make it go as long as it could and it certainly did."

Up Next
• The Raiders finish this regular season Saturday when Lehigh comes into town. That game is scheduled for a noon tip and will be broadcast live on CBS Sports Network.  
• Colgate will host its annual Alzheimer's Awareness Game during that contest as well as acknowledge seven special senior players.
• The Mountain Hawks are coming off an 84-65 victory over Bucknell on Wednesday.
• Heading into Saturday's contest, Lehigh sits with a 10-7 conference mark and are in sole possession of third place in the Patriot League Tournament.
• The Raiders and Mountain Hawks will go head-to-head for their 86th all-time meeting. Colgate holds the 50-35 record advantage.
• Colgate took a 68-61 victory over Lehigh earlier in the season when Jacobs went for a game-high 24 points on a perfect 9-for-9 shooting.