THIBODAUX, La. – After a hard-fought win on Thursday night, the Nicholls men's hoops team returns to action on Saturday afternoon hosting the Southeastern Louisiana Lions at 3:30 p.m. in Stopher Gym in Thibodaux.
 
The contest against the Lions will begin 30 minutes after the completion of the women's game against SLU which begins at 1:30 p.m. in Thibodaux, as fans can purchase their tickets online at NichollsTickets.com for $7. For fans unable to make the game, live stats and video will be provided at GeauxColonels.com and the Nicholls Athletics mobile apps, with the game being aired on the all-new ESPN 100.3 FM and KLEB 1600 AM.
 
The Colonels are coming off of a grueling, 88-83 win over the New Orleans Privateers to open Southland Conference play on Thursday night, improving to 3-0 at home this season. Nicholls enters the contest with a 4-6 overall record, while Southeastern dropped its opener on the road to McNeese State to fall to 5-7 on the season.
 
The 88 points the team scored against the Privateers are a season high for the squad, as the team is averaging over 84 points at home this year, while shooting over 50 percent from the floor during those contests. Nicholls had 14 assists on 28 made shots from the field against UNO, improving to 4-1 on the year when dishing out that many or more in a game.
 
The club also put together team highs in free throws made with 27 and steals with 11, forcing New Orleans into 22 total turnovers.
 
Dantrell Thomas leads the team in scoring averaging 15.3 points per game through ten games this year, scoring in double figures in each of the last six after having 16 points, four assists, three steals and a block Thursday night. Thomas, who was plagued with foul trouble along with much of the team, did most of his damage from the free throw line going 7-for-10 from the charity stripe to tie his career best for makes.
 
Although the senior from Many is the team's leading scorer, the night's top point producer on Thursday was fellow senior Jeremy Smith who scored a season-high 17 points on an efficient 6-for-8 from the floor, earning 11 of his points in the first half. Smith is averaging a career-high 12.3 points per game this season and has matched his entire total of double-digit games from last year with his seventh against the Privateers.
 
Although UNO continued the season trend of taking opponents taking a bevy of free throws during the game, Nicholls got the play it needed from key areas, the biggest being the bench as the group outscored the visitors 37-22 in bench points. J'Dante' Frye continues to impress as he scored a new personal best 10 points in 30 minutes of work, while Amin Torres scored 10 to snap a three-game scoreless streak and Sam McBeath scored seven.
 
One area the Colonels will hope to limit is the number of fouls the team seems to accumulate over the course of a game, as the team committed a program-record 39 and has 278 this season which is almost 90 more than opposing teams this year.
 
Southeastern Louisiana is led in scoring by JaMichael Hawkins and Antonnio Benton, as both average a little over 11 points per game, while Benton leads the team in rebounding averaging 6.8 boards per game.
 
The Lions have been beset by injury as of late, as in the game against the Cowboys SLU had six players play over 20 minutes in the game with three playing 35 minutes or greater. McNeese rallied from an 11-point deficit to go up by that same margin during the game to hold off the Lions for good late.
 
Nicholls is hoping to snap a three-game losing skid to the Lions, as Southeastern has won four of the last five meetings against the Colonels including the two games last season.
 
 
 
GAMEDAY INFORMATION
TV: None
Radio: ESPN 100.3 FM, KLEB 1600 AM
Broadcast Team: Mike Wagenheim (play-by-play)
Live Stats: www.GeauxColonels.com