MORGANTOWN, W.V. -- The Nicholls State University men's basketball program (6-5, 0-0 Southland) stumbled in Saturday afternoon's northern trek to Big 12 power West Virginia (9-1, 0-0 Big 12), faltering by a final 83-57 margin to the Mountaineers in the Red & Gray's final non-conference contest of the season. Individually, redshirt senior D'Angelo Hunter paced the Colonels in his return to Morgantown, dropping a squad-high 14 points with four rebounds and three steals.

Offensively, Nicholls was unable to find a rhythm matching the team's success over the previous four matchups (105.5 ppg, 52.0 field goal percentage), finishing the day 22-of-61 (36.1 percent) from the floor. In addition to Hunter, fellow senior Elvis Harvey Jr. composed a strong overall performance, racking up the team's only other double-digit showing behind a 12-point, five-rebound finish.

KEY STORYLINES & STATISTICS
-- For the game, Nicholls finished shooting 36.1 percent (22-of-61) from the field, 16.0 percent (4-of-25) at the three-point line and 60.0 percent (9-of-15) from the charity stripe.
-- Notably, both sophomore Warith Alatishe (nine points, nine rebounds) and redshirt junior Andre Jones (nine points, three assists) made significant contributions on both ends of the court.
-- Sparked by a pair of back-to-back dunks from Jones and Alatishe, the Colonels bolted out of the second half on a game-tying 12-4 run, knotting the contest at 43 apiece with 16:43 to play. Over the course of the next six minutes, though, the Mountaineers reclaimed their lead and then some behind a 15-2 run of their own, grabbing a double-digit lead they would never surrender.

UP NEXT
With the non-conference slate wrapped up at West Virginia, the Colonels head back to the bayou for their Southland opener against Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, tipoff with the Islanders scheduled for 7 p.m. on Wednesday, Dec. 18 at Stopher Gym.

STAY SOCIAL
For more information on Colonels Men's Basketball, follow the team on Twitter (@Nicholls_MBB), Instagram (@geauxcolonels) and like their Facebook page (Nicholls Athletics).