Young talent surprises Nicholls State basketball coach

Prior to last Wednesday’s season opener, the talk surrounding the Nicholls State basketball team was the amount of depth and experience the Colonels had.

With seniors Justin Payne and Ryan Bathie returning, head coach J.P. Piper touted the upcoming season.

But in his 79-62 win over the UNO Privateers on Wednesday, he realized his freshmen weren’t that bad either.

Two of the Colonels’ double-digit scorers, Kyle Ford (11 points) and Fred Hunter (19 points), were wearing high school uniforms just a year ago.

Piper was pleased with the performance of his newcomers. Apparently his team appears even deeper than he originally thought.

“I knew those guys were capable of doing that and we hoped they would,” he said. “It’s nice to see that we were comfortable enough in a Division I contest to be able to go out there and get the job done.”

Hunter, who had both nerves and a pre-game illness to overcome, not only put up big numbers, but also had six rebounds and one assist. He scored nine of the Colonels’ last 15 points in the final four minutes of the game.

“It feels good to finally be able to play college basketball,” the freshman said. “I wasn’t feeling well before the game, but that wasn’t going to stop me. I just went out there and played it off.”

Ford, on the other hand, was the Colonels’ biggest threat from behind the arch. He finished the night 3-for-7 from three-point range.

As for the game, after finding themselves down 19-21 with 7:53 left in the first half, sophomore Dominic Friend nailed a three-point shot to put the Colonels ahead 22-21.

From there, the Colonels went on a 19-5 run to carry a 41-26 lead into halftime.

“At halftime coach told us to be prepared because they were going to make a run at us,” Hunter explained. “It was only a matter of time.”

Apparently, Piper was right. Behind the play of leading scorer Darrian McKinstry (28 for the night and 22 in the second half), the Privateers were able to pull it within three, 59-56, with 6:18 remaining.

“McKinstry is a heck of a player and watching him on film we were scared to death of him. We knew he could do that,” Piper said. “I wasn’t pleased that we gave up the run but I was really excited that we never got so rattled that we gave in and the game came back to us.”

The Colonels finished strong however, behind the play of Hunter and Bathie to go on a 9-0 run to pull away 69-56 with 3:11 remaining in the game. They did not relinquish the lead from that point on.

Even with senior Justin Payne (four points) on the bench with foul trouble, the Colonels did not miss a beat as sophomore Kellen Carter played the point.

With four minutes left of play, Carter fouled out of the game and Payne returned to keep the tempo and seal the win.

“I told Payne that Kellen is going to play until he fouls out, and he (Payne) was going to bring us home,” Piper noted. “Those are our two leaders; they set the tone. It’s a little bit of a roll of the dice, but I was comfortable rolling the dice with those two guys out there fighting the battle for us.”

Overall, the coach said he is pleased with the win but now must turn their attention to the World Vision Invitational on the campus of Illinois State. The Colonels will play a three-game round robin against Illinois State, UC-Santa Barbara and Winston-Salem State.

Piper said after getting the season started on a high note, it is now time to see what his team is really made of.

“Our guys responded, and I think we have a good basketball team,” he said. “I felt that several weeks ago, and I feel that even more now. It gets harder now because we may not have had UNO’s attention, but we’ll have everyone else’s. It gets a little tougher, but we’re excited about it.”

Note: The Colonels went on the road Saturday, falling to the Tulane Green wave 72-70. Hunter once again was the Colonels’ high scorer with a career-high 23 points.