NEW LONDON, N.H. (Feb. 23) – The Nichols College men’s basketball team fell to Colby-Sawyer, 82-65, in The Commonwealth Coast Conference quarterfinals Tuesday evening at Coffin Field House. The fifth-seeded Bison drop to 14-11 overall and await a possible ECAC DIII New England Tournament berth. The fourth-seeded Chargers improve to 15-11 and advance to the semifinals Thursday to face top-seeded Gordon at 7 p.m. in Wenham, Mass.
Pete Atkins (Gainesville, Fla.) led the Bison with 24 points, scoring 14 in the first half on five-of-eight shooting, including two three pointers. Senior guard Bryan Riley (West Boylston, Mass.) added 23 points, scoring 17 in the second half.
Jon Chaloux and Jason Chevrefils each scored 21 points for the Chargers to lead four players in double-digit scoring. Corey Willis added 14 and Will Bardaglio chipped in with 12 to go with a team-high seven rebounds.
Nichols jumped out to an early seven-point lead on one of Atkins’ treys, but Colby-Sawyer rallied back to tie on a Bardaglio trifecta and the teams traded leads five times before the Bison regained control of the game. A pair of free throws from Chris Paquin (Barre, Mass.) put the Bison up by six with less than a minute left in the stanza, and Nichols carried a 30-26 advantage into the break.
The teams traded threes to open the second half, but a David Rosso three put the Chargers in the driver’s seat at 36-35 and the home team didn’t look back, running out to a 14-point lead by the 12:06 mark.
Nichols chipped away at the deficit, cutting it to seven on a Justin Kuntz (Wallingford, Conn.) layup at 9:48, but the home team again brought its advantage back up to double-digits, where it would stay for the remainder of the game.
Nichols finished the night firing 38.7% and was a perfect 12-for-12 at the line. The Bison held a slim 38-37 rebounding advantage. Colby-Sawyer maintained a turnover advantage at 7-15 and created 20 points off of the Bison’s errors.
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