The men's swimming and diving team will try to end its dual-meet season with a bang tomorrow afternoon when it heads north to Olean, N.Y., to face St. Bonaventure.

Penn State (8-1), currently ranked No. 23 in the nation, will be trying for its best record in men's swimming and diving history when it faces the Bonnies at 2 tomorrow afternoon.

St. Bonaventure, which was pounded by the Lions last year, 78-35, is on a roll after an easy beating of West Virginia last weekend, and tomorrow will have a stonger, more experienced lineup against Penn State than the one it swam last year.

The Lions, who routed Division II Shippensburg last weekend, 143-102, are looking to achieve much the same goals this weekend as they did last, with Eastern Championships less than two weeks away.

"We're looking to execute well and hope that the guys that aren't going (to Easterns) and have shaved for this last meet will be able to pop some more lifetime-bests," Coach Peter Brown said. "For the guys that are going to Easterns, we want to work on using the meet to work on race strategies."

Brown said he has tapered workouts and rested the swimmers, focusing mainly on sprint exercises, as opposed to long-distance ones, to avoid excessive fatigue.

Against a fairly potent Bonnie team, Penn State will return to a slightly stronger lineup than it used last weekend against Shippensburg. St. Bonaventure's strength lies with its short-distance sprinters, Brown said, but as a team they lack depth.

The Bonnies should challenge the Lions top-line swimmers in the 50-, 100-, and 200-meter freestyle events and for that reason, Brown will oppose St. Bonaventure with his best swimmers in those events.

Penn State's top short-distance freestyler, Walt Sopp, will oppose the Bonnies individually in the 50 freestyle as well as in the 200 freestyle and medley relay races, all events he will swim at Easterns in two weeks.

"We're looking forward to getting our last dual meet out of the way and prepping for Easterns," Sopp said. "I have no real goals for this meet -- I just want to go out and have some good races."

The divers, who have put together their strongest string of performances this season, will use a different lineup tomorrow afternoon. The Lions top three divers, Jeff Eagles, Steve Zamborsky and Chris Devine, all of whom have made cut scores on both the 1- and 3-meter board for the NCAA pre-qualifying meet, will not travel with the team to Olean, and will instead use the weekend to rest for Easterns.

Coach Craig Brown has decided to dive Craig Flanagan, who has seen little action all season, and Joe Marsh, who is heading to Easterns with the top three, but needs to gain more confidence in his dives.

"(Marsh) is in need of a meet where it's just him getting a shot at winning, and he's not in the shadow of the other three guys," Brown said.