Rebowe: playoff loss won’t define season to remember for Nicholls football team

The 2023 football season is one the Nicholls football team will never forget.

From a 0-3 start, a canceled game against a rival, undefeated conference champions, and being stranded at an airport, it was a memorable season for the Colonels.

But will a 35-0 loss at Southern Illinois in the opening round of the Football Championship Subdivision playoffs be the defining moment for the 2023 Colonels?

“We are not going to let this game define the season and what we did,” Nicholls coach Tim Rebowe declared shortly after the season ended. “You know, we really had a good year.”

“Conference champs. You can’t take that away, 7-0 first time in the history of the school, a lot of good things,” Rebowe continued. “You do have a little bit of a bitter taste in your mouth, a little bit sour taste in your mouth, the way it ended, but it’s still not going to overshadow the year that we had. As they say, time heals all wounds. There’re times like this, you’ve got to take the good with the bad.”

The bad came when Nicholls fell behind 21-0 quickly against Southern Illinois. It was not unlike the start of the season when the Colonels lost their first three games of the year.

“You go back, we reverted to it again. They had interceptions (by the SIU defense), we had a fumble. We didn’t get any. The field position was really tough. We were backed up. They had some short drives after some turnovers. That’s when you end up not being successful in games when you can’t do those things. The things that we were doing early in the year, we had it kind of corrected for that stretch and then it reared its ugly head again,” Rebowe said.

Mistakes helped to contribute to losses to Sacramento State, Tulane, and TCU to open the season.

Then came a chance to wipe the slate clean with the start of Southland Conference play.

“At that time, you didn’t know,” said Rebowe. “You just thought everybody’s record was 0-0, don’t look at the record.

“I’m thinking, you’ve got to go to McNeese, a good program, good history and (playing) on the road. We hadn’t had a lot of success there on the road when you look at the big picture. It was good for us to go get that win and then you say, ‘hey, I’m coming home against Houston Christian and Northwestern, back-to-back home game, so it was huge, huge to get off to a good 1-0 start.”

Nicholls did get a win over Houston Christian, but the Colonels lost out on a chance to take on Northwestern State in Thibodaux after the Demons canceled the remainder of their season following the shooting death of a team member.

Following a win at Texas A&M-Commerce that moved Nicholls to 4-0 in the conference play, the Colonels lost a non-conference game at home to Southeast Missouri 35-31.

“I thought the Southeast Missouri game, as much as it hurt us, playing at home, you want to get that win, it comes down to one play at the end,” Rebowe said. “We had a chance to win the game, so I don’t think that hurt us as bad as I think it actually helped us. I think it helped propel us a little bit. It’s not like you got blown out 35-0 and you’re trying to come back.”

Then came a stretch in which the Colonels played three games in 12 days and a conference championship title looming.

Playing at No. 4 University of Incarnate Word, Nicholls fell behind 10-0 after one period before exploding for 24 points in the second quarter on the way to a 45-32 win.

A 37-24 win the following week at home against Lamar clinched no worse than a share of the Southland title and an automatic bid to the playoffs.

Playing only five days later, the Colonels had a chance at a rare feat in school history by going unbeaten in league play to capture the SLC crown.

“It was a short week, which is good, I think, because you are coming off an emotional celebration on the field with getting presented the trophy and doing all that,” Rebowe said. “We didn’t have time for a hangover. It was really, really good. You had to get back to work on Sunday and an abbreviated week and put all our stuff in place.

“You went to Southeastern against your rival team, who has still had a lot to play for – winning four games in a row and saying, ‘hey, we’ve beaten the conference champs.’ So it was good. Our guys prepared. Again, we didn’t play our best game, but found the way to win the game and be outright champs.”

Nicholls fell behind 21-0 early against Southern Illinois but missed out on chance to score to close the first half when being stopped on fourth down inside the Salukis’ 5-yard line. The Colonels got the ball to start the second half but were forced to punt. On SIU’s first play of the ensuing possession, Bo Elliott broke loose right up the middle for a 60-yard touchdown run to extend the Salukis’ lead to 28-0 and dash any Colonel hopes of a comeback.

A long ride home following a tough loss was made even longer when the Colonels were stranded at the airport for almost 24 hours.

Now comes a time for reflection and perspective.

“We did a lot of good things.” Rebowe said. “Are we still a work in progress? Absolutely. But now we can take a deep breath a little bit. Yeah, we wanted to go further. It didn’t end like we wanted it to end. Yes, we wanted to represent the conference. That was a little bit of a disappointment, but at the end of the day, there were 24 (playoff teams) left standing we were one of them.”