In their eighth home game in two weeks, the Nicholls baseball team beat Tulane University 2-1 on Tuesday night, Nicholls’ first win over the Green Wave since 2013.

Entering the game, the Colonels (8-9, 1-2) ranked third nationally in stolen bases (29) sixth in sacrifice flies (10), and 31st in both hits (139) and triples (5).

The Colonels sent long time reliever Daniel Goff to the mound to make his first career start, while Tulane countered with J.P. France. France was outstanding for the Green Wave, tossing 6 innings of 4 hit, shutout ball tallying six strikeouts.

Goff cruised early, allowing one base runner through four innings on a swinging bunt by Richard Carthon that lead off the third. Goff answered by inducing fly-outs to right and center field. Alex Tucker then gunned out Richard Carthon trying to steal second for the third out of the inning.

“His tempo was fantastic and he did what he wanted to do for a while,” head coach Seth Thibodeaux said.

The Colonels got things going early offensively, following a 7-pitch inning to start the game by Goff. After going down 0-2 in the count, leadoff hitter Ethan Valdez was hit by a breaking ball and awarded first base. Shortstop Joey Morales sacrificed him over to second, putting him in scoring position for third baseman Kyle Reese. After Reese struck out, right fielder Alex Shermer drew a walk.

With two on and two outs, and down in the count two strikes, left fielder Gavin Wheby foul tipped a pitch into the catcher’s mit for the third out, leaving the runners stranded.

In the bottom half of the third, the Colonels whipped up some more two-out voodoo that has served them well in the early part of the season. After first baseman Dylan Manichia and Valdez struck out, France’s sixth through three innings, Morales reached on an error by the Green Wave shortstop. Reese followed with an infield hit, but Shermer tapped out to the catcher to end the threat.

Tulane lead off the fifth inning with a base hit by Lex Kaplan. Goff then struckout Hunter Hope, and induced a groundball from Grant Witherspoon that Morales shoveled to second for the force-out, but the Colonels could not turn two on the play. Carthon followed with a single to left, and Matt Braud walked to load the bases.

Goff settled in after the walk, and got Jarret Dehart to fly out to deep left field to end the inning.

In five innings of work, Goff allowed 0 runs on 3 hits and struck out 3.

Robbie Petty entered the game in the sixth inning with a runner on first, but quickly found himself in a bases loaded jam following a base hit to centerfield, which bounced out of the globe of a diving Justin Holt, and a bunt single.

“It’s something we work on, and you have to trust your players,” Thibodeaux said. “Holt saw something and took advantage of it. There was never any doubt we were going for the squeeze, but Holt did a great job of really heads up base running.”

Petty then faced Tulane’s hottest hitter in Kaplan. After getting ahead in the count, Petty got Kaplan to tap back to the mound where Petty, Tucker and Manichia combined for a 1-2-3 double play. A fly out by the next better ended the threat for the Green Wave, who failed to score with the bases loaded for the second straight inning.

The Green Wave struck first in the top of the seventh off of Zach Thiac.

After a pop out to left field, Carthon singled to left for his second hit of the game. After a strikeout for the second out, left fielder Jarret Dehart laced a double off the top of the right field wall that scored Carthon all the way from first. Thiac got leadoff hitter Cade Edwards to lineout back to the mound for the third out.

The Colonels looked to answer right back in their half of the inning. Wheby leadoff with a base hit to center, but was picked off at first by one of the best throwing catchers in the nation, Jake Rodgers, when designated hitter Kyle Knauth missed on a bunt. Knauth then drove a ball to the left field wall for a double, chasing France from the mound.

Tulane sent their designated Jeremy Montalbano to the mound with a runner in scoring position for the Colonels. Justin Holt hit a ball between the shortstop and third baseman, which Braud attempted to throw to third to nab Knauth, but threw the ball away. Holt advanced to second on the error.

Tucker then laid down a sacrifice bunt as Knauth broke from third with the pitch and the Colonels successfully performed a squeeze play that plated their first run. However, the Green Wave did not see Holt, who was stealing third as Knauth broke home, round the base at full speed as Tucker was thrown out at first, and slid home to score the second run on the play.

Hunter Speer came on to retire the Greenwave in the eighth, and Mike Hanchar closed out the ninth to earn his first save for the Dirty Red.

“College baseball is about taking advantage of your opportunity. Sometimes it’s going to be one inning,” Thibodeaux said.

Nicholls will conclude their nine-game home stand tomorrow night as the host Southern University at 6 p.m. on campus.