THIBODAUX – Growing pains are to be expected with a young roster like the one the Northwestern State football team fields.
 
Couple that with a day when seemingly every close play went in favor of homestanding Nicholls, the Demons found themselves on the short end of a 20-0 Southland Conference score at Manning Field at John L. Guidry Stadium on Saturday morning.
 
"Nicholls is kind of the standard in our league right now," first-year head coach Blaine McCorkle said. "They're the model of how we want to build our program and hopefully do it bigger and better, but today was a game of just a few plays. I think we dropped three or four interceptions that could have been some big momentum swings. Our defense played tremendously with a lot of energy and effort. On offense, every time we felt we could get something going, the wheels fell off."
 
Seemingly each time the Demons (0-8, 0-3) came up short on a potential momentum-shifting play, the veteran-laden Colonels (3-4, 1-1) capitalized.
 
Nicholls did not need any help on its first scoring drive of the game, marching 73 yards on 11 plays in the first quarter. Quarterback Pat McQuaide capped the drive with the first of his two touchdown passes on the day, finding running back Miequle Brock for a 7-yard score.
 
That would mark the last time the Colonels had a scoring drive that did not feature a near turnover.
 
Northwestern's defense appeared to have bent and not broken early in the second quarter, forcing the Colonels into a third and 12 at the Demon 23-yard line.
 
Linebacker Blake Gotcher sniffed out McQuaide's pass to tight end Lee Negrotto and appeared poised to record his first interception as a Demon. Instead, the pass sailed through his hands, hitting Negrotto in stride for a 23-yard score and a 14-0 lead less than 17 minutes into the game.
 
With the way the Demons struggled to move the ball Saturday, the two-score lead was enough for Nicholls to win the first matchup between the teams in Thibodaux since 2021.
 
"We catch a pass and turn it over," McCorkle said. "We have a good scramble from (quarterback) Q (Quaterius Hawkins) and he finds someone open down the field, and we get a chop block on a protection where there should never be a chop block. There were just some weird plays in the game offensively that didn't allow us to get ahead. Nicholls played us exactly how I would play us with our current injury situation. They forced us to keep the ball in the box, and we're not good enough up front right now to win that battle."
 
Nicholls, which entered the game with the No. 2 rush defense in the nation, held the Demons to 15 yards on 28 carries. The longest play of the day for Northwestern came when Reed Honshtein galloped 21 yards on a fake punt.
 
Honshtein averaged 42.8 yards on 10 punts, including a career-long 67-yarder, to provide a complement for a Demon defense that limited Nicholls to six points in the final 43-plus minutes of the game.
 
"Good for Reed and our punt unit," McCorkle said. "They gave us a chance to stay in the game. Reed was outstanding today, pinning them back and making a play on the fake punt. When you're struggling on offense, you need to be really, really good in those phases to try to flip the field and steal some hidden yards.'
 
On the Colonels' two drives that ended with field goals, the Demons just missed a chance to get off the field.
 
Following a fumble that gave Nicholls possession in Demon territory, Caesar Magee III could not corral a potential third-down interception in the end zone. One play later, Gabe Showalter connected on a 35-yard field goal to extend the Colonels' lead to 17-0.
 
Redshirt freshman safety Jeremiah Keppard nearly collected his first career pick on the first play of Nicholls' second drive of the second half. Given second life, the Colonels added a 39-yard Showalter field goal with 6:48 to play in the third quarter to complete the scoring.
 
"I am still encouraged," McCorkle said. "Eight games in, our kids are still fighting. They're still playing hard. We talk about it every week – and I know people get tired of hearing it — but I think we played even more freshmen this week. We had three guys go in for the first time, and they got some good reps against the best there is in the league outside of Incarnate Word. We'll go back to work next week and see if we can get ready for Lamar."
 
The Demons return to action in a week when they host Lamar for Homecoming. Kickoff is set for 2 p.m. at Turpin Stadium.