The Nicholls State football team started the 2006 season with a win by defeating Southern Arkansas 35-0 last Thursday, but the team will have much more of a challenge when the Colonels travel to face perennial Big XII power Nebraska in Lincoln on Saturday. The game against Nebraska will be the first of two back-to-back Division I road games on the Colonels schedule, with the second game against a Louisiana Tech team that lost to Nebraska 49-10 in its first game of the season.

Head Coach Jay Thomas said although his team did well against Southern Arkansas, his coaching staff is using this time to put the best players in the right positions. “We want to look at a lot of players in different spots, but our main goal is to do what we can to be ready for Saturday,” he said.

The Nicholls defense held the Muleriders to only 200 yards of total offense during the game and forced four fumbles, with the Colonels recovering two. The Muleriders were never able to gain more than an average of 2.3 yards per carry rushing against Nicholls, only gaining 94 yards on the ground.

Thomas said his defense is doing well but needs to get better at getting to the quarterback. “Our secondary definitely got the job done, so now we just have to get our line to put some pressure on the quarterback so we can create more turnovers,” Thomas said.

Starting his first game as quarterback, Vincent Montgomery only threw four passes, but completed three of them for 66 yards and rushed for 21 yards. The Colonels were able to gain 195 yards on the ground, which produced all four of the Colonels’ touchdowns.

Although the team was able to capitalize on the offensive side of the ball, the Colonels allowed five sacks during the game and turned the ball over twice, fumbling on rushing plays. Thomas said that his team has to do better protecting the ball and expects his team to hold on to the ball more effectively.

Nebraska is coming off a 49-10 win over Louisiana Tech that saw the Cornhuskers score only seven points in the first quarter en route to scoring 42 points in the next three quarters.

Although the Cornhuskers were ranked 105th in the country in rushing, the team ran for over 250 yards in the game using four players, and it was the first time a Nebraska team ran for over 200 yards in a game since the 2004 season.

Thomas said his team is aware of how dangerous the Nebraska offense can be, and his defense has its work cut out for them.

“Zac has a talented arm, but there are a number of guys up front that do a good job of protecting him,” Thomas said. “We’re going to have to defend the whole field in order to prevent them from scoring.”

In scoring 10 points throughout the entire game, Louisiana Tech was still able to gain 67 yards rushing. Thomas hopes to use the triple offense to throw off a Nebraska defense that may not see the triple offense regularly. “We’re going to have to be deceptive in what we’re going to do and hopefully we can gain an advantage in that,” he said.

The Colonels will return home to play South Dakota State before starting conference play against Southeastern. With the two games against Division I opponents, Thomas believes these games will prepare his team for the rest of theconference.

“The speed and tempo of the games will give us the ability to get faster as a team, and what we take from those games will carry over into South Dakota and the rest of the conference,” Thomas said.