MORRISTOWN, TN — While Senators are typically legislative, Walters State's beat-down of Dyersburg State on Saturday afternoon was judicious.

The Senators defeated the Eagles 125-53, avenging the loss that knocked them out of the playoffs just a season ago.

"We just wanted to send a message and set a standard of playing hard," Senators head coach Jerry Nichols said following the win. " We played Georgia Highland on Wednesday, and I just didn't feel like we played as hard as we could play. I think tonight we showed how hard we wanted to play and showed a little bit of traditional Walters State and a little bit of how special this team can be.

"To both," Nichols continued when asked if that message was meant for his players or the rest of the Conference. "To both, to be honest with you. We're holding these guys to a standard to be elite everyday and I think they accepted the challenge tonight."

If Wednesday night's effort was in question, Saturday's was undeniable.

The Senators applied constant, frenetic full court pressure for all 80 minutes, forcing a staggering 27 turnovers.

"That's something we practice everyday. We want to press teams, we want to play fast, we want to force them to play fast and out of control, and early in the game I think you could really see that from our guys," Nichols said. "Once they saw it early, I think our guys smelled a little bit of blood and just kept it going. That's how we want to play all season, we want to make teams play to our speed."

Up 70 points with a six second difference between the shot clock and the game clock in the fourth, you could hear Nichols shout, "We're not going to take a turnover here," as he called one final action for his offense, further cementing the message of consistent attitude and effort.

All 13 Senators saw the floor on Saturday, and 12 got on the board. That paired with the 34 assists the team racked up shows what a uniquely unselfish attitude the team possesses, particularly for the Junior College level.

"We talk about it all the time; we love to share the basketball. Right now I think we're number two in the country in assists, and we're going to try and continue to be there all year. When you have a team that can share the ball like that, you're hard to guard. When you just make the right play; get in the paint, make the right read and play extremely hard, the game will reward unselfish play."

Being such a lengthy, disruptive team on the defensive end, it's evident that the Senators like to get out in transition.

What you wouldn't realize at first glance, however, is that they possess perhaps an equal knack for hitting outside shots. Walters shot 15-34 from beyond the arc on Saturday, with seven different Senators hitting one of their own.

Their combination of speed, length, unselfishness and outside shooting gives them high-level dimensionality in transition. Nichols has identified that and adopted an offensive philosophy of "pace and space".

"Pace and space is definitely a philosophy of ours," Nichols said. "We're always talking about pace, you'll hear me yelling 'three seconds' from the sideline because we want to score it in three. We challenge these guys all the time to play at that type of pace. We play fast in practice as well."

Malachi Hale led all scorers with 19 off the bench, going 7-9 from downtown. Greg Moore's 18, Ramondo Battle's 16, Jamar Livingston's 13, Terrance Jacobs' 12 and Micah Simpson's 10 rounded out the scorers in double figures as the Senators had six in total.

While being only the team's third-leading scorer on Saturday, Battle's skillset is what stuck out most. 

At 6 '8, Battle couples efficient outside shooting with a high release point that's tough for any defender to contest. 

His long arms and quick feet make him a disruptive defender as well, exemplified by his three steals and blocked shot in the contest.

"Ramondo is a special talent. Top 50 Junior College prospect in the country last season as a freshman. He decided to come to Walters State and we're elated to have him," Nichols said. "Obviously he's already signed with Evansville University, he's one of the leaders on our team and we're going to continue to need him to play an important role going forward." 

The Senators have a quick turnaround as they play Bryan College JV on Monday at 5:30. Fortunately they'll still have fresh legs, as only one player saw more than 20 minutes in Saturday's matchup.

"We're training them, obviously we're still getting better. This is just the first game of what I think will be many that people will get to see our potential and what we can do, but we still have a long way to go. We're excited about the process and we're looking forward to our next opponent," Nichols said.

Rob Harvey

Walters State Community College

Sports Information Director

Cell: (423) 779-8880

Email: sportsinfo@ws.edu

Website: www.ws.edu/athletics