KATY, Texas - The Nicholls State University men's basketball team (14-13, 8-8 Southland Conference) will go in search of an opening round upset when the eighth-seeded Colonels take on regular season champion and No. 1 seed McNeese State (19-10, 11-5 Southland Conference) with a 6 p.m. tipoff against the Cowboys in the first round of the 2011 State Farm Southland Conference Tournament at the Leonard E. Merrell Center in Katy, Texas.

It marks the program's third consecutive postseason trip, tying a school record run set when Nicholls advanced to the Southland Conference Tournament in 1999, 2000 and 2001.

The Colonels will be looking to avenge a pair of losses suffered at the hands of the Cowboys during the regular season.  Nicholls, which entered the season as the top pick in the Southland Conference East Division in the league's coaches preseason coaches poll, got off to a strong start in 2010-11, extending its home court winning streak to 11 games before suffering a one-point loss to McNeese on Jan. 26 in Stopher Gym.

In the middle of the tightest conference race in the country, the Colonels suffered a setback in the home stretch of the season when junior guard/forward Fred Hunter suffered a season ending knee injury on Feb. 8.  Without the team's second leading scorer, leading rebounder and owner of the nation's 19th best field goal percentage, Nicholls lost four of it's final seven contests, including a 71-51 loss at McNeese in the regular season series finale in Lake Charles on Feb. 26, and a pair of hard-fought decisions against the top scoring defense in the nation in Stephen F. Austin on Feb. 9 (the day after Hunter's injury) and at Southeastern Louisiana on the final day of the regular season.

The Colonels will look to regain the form that saw them earn a pair of thrilling last minute victories without Hunter on Feb. 19 against Texas-San Antonio (54-52 on a last second tip-in off an offensive rebound by senior forward Anatoly Bose) and an 83-81 win in overtime over Northwestern State on March 2.

Nicholls has been led all season long by Bose, who has proven to be one of the most reliable scorin gthreats in the country each of the past two seasons.  The Sydney, Australia native earned all-conference honors for the third consecutive season after being named first team All-Southland on Tuesday, after leading the conference and ranking in the top ten in the nation in scoring average the entire season.

Bose heads into postseason play ranked eighth in the nation with a 22.0 point/game average, and ranked as high as second in the country at one point.  Bose has scored 20 or more points in 19 of 27 games this season and became just the third player in school history with 2,000 career points by racking up 2,025 points through the end of the regular season.

Bose heads into the 2011 Southland Conference Tournament needing 60 points to pass Lamar's BB Davis for tenth on the league's career scoring list and 100 points to pass former Colonel Reggie Jackson for the ninth best point total in conference history and the best career point total in Nicholls' NCAA Division I history.

A prolonged postseason run would help Bose continue to climb the conference scoring lists, but the Colonels will have to get past the Cowboys firts.  McNeese is led by a quartet of double digit scorers, including Patrick Richard (16.1 points/game), Diego Kapelan (14.8 points/game), Stephan Martin (10.3 points/game) and P.J. Alowoya (10.2 points/game).  The Cowboys shoot .354 from three-point range, the second best mark in the league, and have the top rebounder in the league in the form of Alowoya (10.4 rebounds/game).

Nicholls answers with a defense that ranks second in the conference and 31st nationally, limiting opponents to 61.8 points/game.  The swarming Colonel defense also boasts an 8.8 steal/game average that ranks second in the conference and 39th nationally, and a +4.4 turnover margin that leads the league and ranks sixth in the country.

Backing up Bose is senior point guard Kenny Franklin Jr., who ranks 39th nationally with a 2.3 assist/turnover ratio, and senior guard and defensive specialist Kellan Carter who is averaging 1.8 steals/game (the 78th best mark in the country) and needs just 11 more steals to reach the 200 career steals mark.

Tipoff between the Colonels and Cowboys is set for 6 p.m. on Wednesday at the Leonard E. Merrel Center in Katy, Texas.  The game can be heard in the New Orleans-Houma-Thibodaux area on the Colonel Sports Radio Network, including KLRZ 100.3 FM and KLEB 1600 AM, and a free live streaming video webcast will be made available at www.southland.org.