Nicholls’ football team heads into the Southland Conference portion of their schedule with more wins than they have had in the previous two years combined.
In the Colonels’ first five games, they’ve notched a record of 3-2 with their most recent win coming from Arkansas Tech University, 44-34, for homecoming.
The team’s three wins this season are the most they’ve tallied since Head Coach Charlie Stubbs’ first season in Thibodaux when the Colonels finished four wins.  Nicholls only won two games in 2011 and 2012, both of which were against National Association for Intercollegiate Athletics member, Evangel University.
“We got seven tough conference games right in a row. So you bet for this program to have a winning season before we get to conference play is a huge confidence boost,” Stubbs said.
Nicholls will begin their conference schedule with a game against in-state rival, Northwestern State University. This year, the Southland Conference looks to be tougher than previous years with many teams boasting strong squads.
“It’s tough to win anywhere. We haven’t been successful the last two years. We’ve been close, but we haven’t been able to finish. So that’s what we’re learning. The few wins we’ve had already this year, we’ve faced adversity where we’ve had to come back, or we didn’t have things go our way. Normally in the past, it just snowballed into a real bad experience, but it didn’t [this year] and we were able to recover which is showing that we’re growing up more and getting more mature as a team,” Stubbs said.
The Colonels have managed to win games despite key injuries on both sides of the ball along the way.
“We have a lot of depth. It’s one thing that’s different about this team than past teams. It’s really every single position has depth. We’ve had guys go down that were maybe starters at the beginning, and somebody steps up and plays just as good, maybe even better,” junior quarterback Beaux Hebert said. “That was something good from camp. You know, all that competition has carried over into the season so far.”
Hebert, who was injured in Nicholls’ first game against Oregon University, and sophomore quarterback Tuskani Figaro have split time under center after junior quarterback Kalen Henderson was injured against Western Michigan.
Against Arkansas Tech, Figaro, who was making his first career start, broke the school’s single-game rushing record with 281 yards on the ground. The Lafayette, La. native also scored five touchdowns with a pair of rushing touchdowns and three through the air.
Some of the players on the team are using the win against Football Bowl Subdivision opponent Western Michigan as a benchmark for what the Colonels could achieve in the Southland Conference.
“It showed us that we can play a whole four quarters together as a team. We haven’t been doing that much since I’ve been here. That was really the first complete game we’ve played. It just shows us that we can put a full game together. If we can compete with an FBS school, then we can compete with anyone in our conference,” senior linebacker Chris Bermond said.