2013-14 Nicholls Men's Basketball Schedule

THIBODAUX, La. – With the 2013-14 season marking his tenth year at the helm of the program, Nicholls State University head men's basketball coach J.P. Piper announced the 2013-14 schedule today which features tilts against national powers in Indiana and Memphis and 12 home games in Stopher Gym.

Piper, who is three wins shy of 100 for his career, put together another challenging slate for his Colonel squad that returns four starters and 10 total letterwinners from last year's team that made it to a record fifth-straight Southland Conference tournament.

"There are some teams in our non-conference that we've played in the past couple of years and some new teams as well that I think will give us a good game and prepare us for conference play in January," Piper said.

The Colonels open the season on Nov. 2 with an exhibition against the University of Mobile in Thibodaux, the first of ten non-conference games in November and December before league play begins in January to an expanded, 14-team Southland Conference.

The most notable game of the season closes out non-con play on Friday, Dec. 20 as the Colonels travel to Bloomington to take on 2013 Big Ten Champion and Sweet Sixteen participant Indiana in historic Assembly Hall. It will be the first meeting between the two teams since 2005 and second all-time meeting between the two schools.

Nicholls will play six games in November, hitting the road for the first few weeks of the regular season to take on Auburn (Nov. 8), North Texas (Nov. 14), Troy (Nov. 19) and Memphis (Nov. 23). In December, Along with the road game against the Hoosiers, Nicholls will also head west for the first-ever meeting on the hardwood against the University of San Francisco (Dec. 14) and return a trip to take on the Jaguars of IUPUI (Dec. 18).

The team will not stray too far from Thibodaux during that time, and make up a lot of those long trips with home games against UTSA on Nov. 26 and Loyola on Dec. 7, getting into the meat of the home slate when league play begins in January which is stacked with five contests in Stopher.

Nicholls will welcome a familiar face to the Southland to open conference play when New Orleans makes its league debut on Jan. 2, hosting Southeastern Louisiana two days later on Saturday, Jan. 4. The second of the league newcomers will head to Thibodaux on Jan. 16 in Houston Baptist, followed by Texas A&M – Corpus Christi on Jan. 18.

The end of the month and beginning of February marks the last two home games for some time for Nicholls, hosting Oral Roberts Jan. 20 and Central Arkansas Feb. 1. Nicholls will not play another home game until the end of February, with games against McNeese State (Feb. 22), Abilene Christian (Feb. 27) and Incarnate Word (March 1) on Senior Day.

Of the nine road games on the schedule, Nicholls will make return trips to McNeese (Jan. 21), UNO (Feb. 13), SLU (Feb. 15), HBU (March 6) and A&M-Corpus Christi (March 8), with single games against Lamar (Jan. 9), Sam Houston State (Jan. 11), regular season champ Stephen F. Austin (Feb. 6) and tournament champ Northwestern State (Feb. 8).

The Southland Conference tournament returns to the Merrell Center in Katy, Texas March 12-15, with the winner receiving the conference's automatic bid into the NCAA Tournament.

Season tickets for men's and women's basketball will be available for purchase at NichollsTickets.com at a later date.