File photo by Travis Rosenau Nick Risen, a 2025 New Ulm High School grad, drives into the lane during a Dec. 6, 2024, boys basketball game against Jackson County Central at NUHS.

FERGUS FALLS — During his time as a member of the New Ulm Eagles boys basketball team, Nick Risen worked and waited for his opportunity to get more varsity playing time.

While the Eagles recently had multiple 1,000-point career scorers and a stable starting rotation for several years, last year featured a team full of underclassmen and new faces taking the court. Risen wasn’t one of those younger players, but he was a senior who stepped into a bigger role and worked for every minute he got.

Now, the 2025 New Ulm grad will continue building on his basketball resume at Minnesota State Community and Technical College in Fergus Falls as a member of the M State Spartans.

Risen said he’s wanted to continue his basketball career in college in some way if possible, and the Spartans, a Minnesota College Athletic Conference team governed by the National Junior College Athletic Association, will make that happen.

“I wanted to play in college for a long time, I had a couple of JUCO offers, then I was going to go to MSU in Mankato,” Risen said. “Kind of last minute right before summer started, the coach, Dave Cresap, texted me on Twitter and was asking me to come up for a visit because they still had a couple spots open. So I went up for a visit and I just really liked it there, so I changed my mind from MSU to go play a couple more years of basketball.”

From 2021-2024, the Eagles and head coach Matt Dennis had a 64-21 record while players like Colton Benson, Charlie Osborne, James Osborne and Nate Firle manned the starting rotation. Both Osbornes finished with more than 1,000 points for their career, while Benson ended his prep career in 2024 with a boys school record of 2,207 points.

Last season, other players were asked to step in like Risen, a 6-4, 200-pound forward who ended up averaging 5.2 points and 5.4 rebounds per game while shooting 43.6% from the field.

While Risen didn’t step in and take over the bulk of the scoring, which was led by twin guards Levi and Mitchell Hopp, but he did a little bit of everything asked of him and his online highlight reels drew the attention of coach Cresap.

“[Coach Cresap] was excited because I was little versatile, I was a good rebounder in high school and he thought I had high character,” Risen said.

Despite the Eagles’ 9-18 finish last season, Risen said he had fun and was happy to be able to help in any way he could.

“My senior year was pretty fun because [coach] Dennis gave me a lot of opportunities to play in multiple ways,” Risen said. “He would let me shoot 3s, he would let me post up, he would let me switch onto guards and that was really fun to do. And just getting to play with the Hopp twins, Joey [Wise] and Owen Castleman … they were all just really fun to help teach, and they would always have questions and just getting to help them, because I know they’ll be good in the future.

“This [past] year wasn’t really about trying win state, I knew that, but just trying to play good for myself and then play good for those guys so they can be better in the future. That was probably the most important part.”

Risen said despite being 6-foot-4, that size isn’t as noticeable for a forward in college, so he is working on developing his athleticism more and hopes to do so throughout his first year with the Spartans. He also said he wants to work on his confidence and get more comfortable learning when to shoot the ball and when to pass.

Last year the Spartans went 30-4, a school record in wins, won the MCAC championship for the first time in 22 years and made it to the NJCAA DIII Men’s Final Four.

With that in mind, Risen hopes to come in and help the team continue that success however possible.

“Coach [Cresap] won two state championships for 1A when he was coaching in high school, and then he used to play at M State,” Risen said. “So he came back and he’s just a really smart guy. When I went on my visit, they had me go around to all the different buildings and talk to the janitors and the secretaries and they were all just very nice and it just felt like a nice community. That was mostly why I chose there over other schools.”

Risen currently will be a part of the Elementary Education Transfer Pathway, but once he transfers out he wants to become a gym teacher.