Final Stats DENTON, Texas – The Nicholls men's basketball team got a season and career-high 27 points from Dantrell Thomas and 17 points from T.J. Carpenter off of the bench, but the North Texas Mean Green held the Colonels to just 12 points in the final 6:53 while connecting on 39 free throws on the night to defeat Nicholls 92-78 Thursday night at The Super Pit in Denton.

Over the course of the last five minutes, UNT (2-1) outscored the Colonels (0-2) 22-9 to pull away for good, making just five shots from the field and converting 12 free throws in the waning minutes of the contest and put the game out of reach. The game was much closer than the final score indicated, as the two teams played to 10 ties and 11 lead changes throughout the contest.

Thomas finished the night an unbelievably efficient 10-of-15 from the field and 7-of-12 from the free throw line with six rebounds, five assists and four steals in 35 minutes to earn his best scoring night as Colonel in the process to lead all players, With Carpenter scoring 15 of the 17 in the second half drilling five of eight 3-pointers before fouling out late in the game.

The Colonels had four players finish with five points or greater on Thursday, as Jeremy Smith scored nine points and led the team with eight rebounds, with Luke Doyle and Amin Torres chipping in seven each as both connected on 3-pointers off of the pine.

Nicholls was called for 29 personal fouls against UNT, allowing the Mean Green to go to the line for much of the night as they finished 39-of-46 from the charity stripe as four players finished scoring in double figures led by Maurice Aniefiok's double-double of 21 points and 10 boards. Alzee Williams was 12-of-14 from the line, making two less than the Colonels made on the night (14) as the squad struggled from the line making 56 percent of its free opportunities.

The rebounding advantage for North Texas was staggering as they pulled down 44 total rebounds to Nicholls' 26, as the Colonels finished one shy of tying UNT in offensive rebounds 11-10, only pulling down 16 defensively to UNT's 33. 

Nicholls barely outscored UNT after the first media timeout of the second half 17-15, but it was a precursor for what the rest of the half ended up becoming as the two teams traded offensive barbs for the rest of the game. That run allowed the Colonels to reclaim the lead, albeit briefly, powered by four 3-pointers by Carpenter to keep the team within single digits of the Mean Green for the rest of the contest.

Leading 60-58 after a Doyle trey, UNT scored five straight after getting a Keith Coleman Layup and Jordan Williams 3-pointer, North Texas' seventh of the game, to go up 63-60. Another Thomas layup and two free throws by Doyle gave Nicholls the lead back up 64-63, but the lead wouldn't stick as a 9-2 run put the Mean Green back up.

Down four points, 70-66, with less than seven minutes remaining in the game, Thomas scored four points with a tough runner and dunk to pull Nicholls even with North Texas at 70.

However, a nearly three-minute scoring drought from the 5:22 mark to the 3:00 minute mark allowed North Texas to score eight consecutive points, getting four points from the free throw line to go up 78-70 to take its biggest lead of the contest into crunch time. The Mean Green also used the final period to attack the team's interior, earning 26 of their 30 points in the paint during that time.

North Texas shot 59 percent in the second half alone and doubled its shots made in the final 20 minutes, scoring 54 total points in the period.

The Colonels shot out of the gate well and led by as many as six points just three minutes into the contest, but went into halftime trailing North Texas 38-36 after the Mean Green closed out the last six minutes of the half outscoring Nicholls 15-8 to take the lead.

Nicholls shot 40 percent in the first half and got 14 points from Thomas in the process, but much like the game against Auburn, Nicholls got into foul trouble quickly and had the Mean Green in the bonus six minutes into the first and not long after the double bonus with a little more than ten minutes remaining. North Texas didn't pick up its second foul of the game until the 11:04 mark of the half, as by that point UNT had taken 13 to Nicholls' four, finishing the half taking 25 free throws as Nicholls had 17 personal fouls.

The Colonels began the game going on a 7-1 run, going into the first media timeout leading 7-4 after getting scores from Thomas, Smith and Horace. The game tied for the first time over the next minute as North Texas went on a five-point swing to tie the game at 9-9, while Nicholls countered with a 6-0 run of its own to push its lead to 15-9.

Scoring got scarce for the squad after that, as constant fouling sent the Mean Green to the line repeatedly throughout much of the rest of the next few minutes. Nicholls went nearly three minutes without getting a made shot from the field, while UNT shot seven consecutive free throws and eight over a span of two minutes that tied the game back up at 17.

While North Texas was making free throws, the Colonels began to get stronger from the field and went on a 9-1 run into the second to last media break leading 26-18 – its largest lead up until that point.

Nicholls forced 12 UNT turnovers in the first half, but was only able to get four more after that as the squad scored 16 points off of Mean Green miscues. The Colonels took good care of the ball with just six turnovers, having just one in the last period.

The Colonels will be back in action on Tuesday night, returning to the state of Alabama to take on the Troy Trojans at 7 p.m.