March 4, 2009

Box Score

THIBODAUX, La. - Sophomore Anatoly Bose (Sydney, Australia/Waverley) poured in a career-high 27 points and Nicholls sank 11 free throws in the final 1:09 of Wednesday night's game in Stopher Gym to claim a 79-77 victory over UT Arlington in Southland Conference men's basketball action.

"I think this win is huge for us, especially on senior night," said Head Coach J.P. Piper. "This is the best gift we can give our guys. Obviously this keeps us in the hunt for a conference championship, so it some significance within the league and the conference race, but to me the biggest thing is that we send Justin [Panye] and Ryan [Bathie] out with a win in their last home game."

With the win, the Colonels, winners of five of their last six games, improve to 18-10 (11-4 SLC), while the Mavericks fall to 16-12 (9-6 SLC).

Bose knocked down 6-of-10 from beyond the arc, adding a 7-for-8 mark at the free-throw line en route to the career-best performance.

Also in double figures were senior Ryan Bathie (Melton, Australia/Mowbray) and freshman Fred Hunter (Denton, Texas/Denton), who scored 20 and 10 points, respectively, and combined for seven rebounds.

Senior Justin Payne (Opelousas, La./Opelousas) paced the Colonel defense with five steals and handed out eight assists on the offensive end, while Bose added four dishes.

"I've told Justin all year that he is our compass and when he is right, we are right," Piper noted. "He doesn't do it by himself, but any time he's had a bad night, we've not had success. To be honest, I didn't think he had a great first half and I challenged him at halftime to think about some of the decisions he had made. I thought he did a tremendous job in the second half and probably made the difference in the game."

The Mavericks led for most of the opening half, pulling ahead by as many as nine in the early goings, but a layup by freshman Cameron McCallum (Melton, Australia/Mowbray) at the 3:25 mark pulled the Colonels within one (30-29), before UTA used a 7-2 run to close out the half and send the teams to the locker room with the score 37-31 in favor of the Mavericks.

Nicholls pulled within early in the second half and took the lead for good as sophomore Dominic Friend (Geelong, Australia/St. Joseph's) laid one in with 11:10 remaining in the game.

The Colonels shot 54.3% (25-of-46) on the night and hit 20-of-27 from the charity stripe. With 20 total assists and eight rebounds, Nicholls handled the ball well, taking advantage with 22 points off of 19 Maverick turnovers.

"What I've learned is that it's hard to win in late February and March," added Piper, "and I'm so proud of our guys for finding ways to gut it out and get the win."

Nicholls will wrap up the regular season on the road, traveling to Lamar Saturday evening for a 7:05 p.m. tip with the Cardinals.

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