The Nicholls State University basketball team rode the momentum of a three-game win streak into the Southland Conference Tournament, where they proved that March is indeed a month of madness.

In the span of 26 hours, the Colonels (11-23, 6-12) played two of the most entertaining, competitive and gritty basketball games of the year. They won in double-overtime against McNeese State University in the first round and lost to Sam Houston State University by one point in the second round.

“It’s exciting because it’s March Madness and we got to be a part of it, but it’s also exhausting,” head coach J.P. Piper said. “I probably got four hours of sleep before the McNeese game. By the time you get to the second game, you’re running on fumes. I wouldn’t have it any other way. ”

In the first game of the tournament, Nicholls played in the first double-overtime game of the SLC tournament since 2006, but it was not the first time the Colonels and Cowboys went to overtime this season. Despite winning the first matchup by fifteen in Thibodaux on Feb. 6, Nicholls dropped the second meeting by two points in the last 19 seconds of overtime three weeks later.

Nicholls seemed to pick up where they left off at the end of the regular season as they jumped out to a seven-point lead early and never trailed in the first half. Liam Thomas led the team with 13 points in the half, and the Colonels used a 15-6 run in the last three minutes to expand their lead to 11 at halftime.

The Colonels were able to keep the Cowboys at a distance throughout the second half until near halfway through the second half. The Cowboys cut the lead to five at the seven and a half minute mark, and tied the game with a little over a minute and a half remaining.

With Nicholls down by two, Schane Rillieux missed the first end of a one-and-one, but Ja’Dante Frye fought for the rebound and was fouled. Frye sank both of his free throws to send the game into overtime.

The game picked up intensity in overtime, as McNeese took the lead in and held onto it throughout the extra period. But Frye’s determination to score got him to the basket with 11 seconds left, and drew another foul. The junior from Thibodaux stepped up to the charity stripe, and hit both attempts to send the game into another five minutes.

With Carpenter fouled out, Frye took over as the aggressor on offense, and his emphatic dunk with one minute remaining was the exclamation point that Nicholls roared into the second round with.

“What a remarkable effort by the guys in our program, against all odds to pull it together,” Piper said. “For 48 hours we were as good as anyone in the tournament. I thought we represented Nicholls well.”

The Colonels stepped back on the court at the Merrill Center in Katy, Texas, less than 24 hours after the win and took on the Bearkats of SHSU. The Colonels lost the previous matchup of the two teams in January by 11 points in Huntsville, Texas.
The Colonels looked to be suffering from tight legs early, as SHSU jumped out to an eight-point lead before the Colonels scored their first basket. Nicholls had to find a way to survive until halftime as their best defensive player and conference leader in blocks, Liam Thomas. Carpenter, the Colonels second leading scorer, was also forced to the bench with foul trouble only eight minutes into the half.

In stepped graduate-transfer Kyle Caudill, who was forced into his most impactful minutes of the season, contributing eight points in the first half. Despite having more turnovers in the first five minutes than shot attempts, the Colonels’ Quinton Thomas channeled the talents of his uncle Chauncey “Mr. Big Shot” Billups. Quinton Thomas hit back-to-back three pointers that sparked Nicholls offense.

“The teams that win in March can bring in a guy who plays eight or nine minutes a night, has to play 16 minutes and he is productive,” Piper said. “Quinton and Kyle came up huge in that game, and these are guys that didn’t get to play some nights. They saw a void and stepped in and filled them.”

Nicholls was unable to gain the lead after tying the score at 21 with seven minutes left, and trailed at by four at halftime. Both teams came out sluggish to start the second half, combining to start 0-12 from the field. However, the intensity was turned back up with seven minutes remaining.

Nicholls took the lead on two good free throws by Tre O’Neal with two minutes to go, and extended the lead to three with two more free-throws by Liam Thomas. But the Bearkats responded with a three-pointer on the other end, and then took a two point on a bucket in the paint with 17 seconds remaining in the game.

Carpenter got the ball on a handoff at on the edge of the Southland Conference logo, deep in behind the three-point line, and let go a shot that seemed to hang in the air suspended in time. The swish of the ball going threw the net gave Nicholls a one point lead with eight seconds left and seemed to extend the Colonels time at the dance on more night.

However, freshman Dakarai Henderson drove the length of the court and made a contested layup against Carpenter and Liam Thomas, ending Nicholls’ season and striking midnight for the Colonels’ Cinderella story.

“It was difficult to talk to them, It was very emotional for me because I was bursting with pride,” Piper said. “The way we lost the game, to be so close, I felt like a parent watching their child in pain and I wanted to take pain from them.”

Piper used the two games to talk life lessons to his players in post-game locker room talks. He told them that in life, you may want things very badly and work your hardest to achieve those goals but you still may not get it. The lesson becomes how does a person respond when facing that adversity.

“Honestly, there was no place I’d rather been than in that locker room with those guys at that moment, whether celebrating a victory or consoling them after the loss,” Piper said. “There was such pride in who they were and what they had become.”