ALVA, Okla.- As the consensus last placed pick in the pre-season Great American Conference polls on top of going winless last year during conference play, most would assume the Northwestern Oklahoma State women's basketball team would be satisfied with playing the perennial-power team of the conference down to the final seconds, but not head coach Tasha Diesselhorst's team.

Her team entered the locker room devastated at the fact that they let a top team in the conference leave Percefull Fieldhouse with a win, a testament to where the program has gone in coach Diesselhorst's first season.

"I felt like the kids did everything to win but win in that game," coach Diesselhorst said, "Walking into the locker room I was so proud of their effort, that was the hardest they've played all season and they were exhausted. It broke my heart to see just how upset they were, but I think that goes to show where the program is going. We're here to beat teams like Harding, not just say we almost beat them."

That crushing lost saw the Lady Rangers have two chances to tie the game up with less than 30 seconds remaining, both attempts not finding their mark. The first-place Lady Bisons came storming back in the final few minutes of the game thanks to two late three-point shots and some questionable foul calling down the stretch. As the dust settles after what would have been arguably the biggest victory of the Lady Rangers program in the Division II era, coach Diesselhorst and company find themselves in a four-way tie for the seventh and eighth places in the conference, a marked improvement over last year's team.

With the top eight teams making the post-season tournament in the GAC, the final stretch of games will be huge in determining whether or not the Lady Rangers will be one of those teams in Bartlesville on March 2-5. Coach Diesselhorst admits that her team knows their positioning in the standings and has been preaching consistency to her team as they continue to improve over the course of the final month of the season.

That developing consistency will be pushed in the locker room as well as on the court by seniors Ashley Pride and Jonae Isaac, who Diesselhorst commented on as being the two players she was most proud of after this weekend's games. Both players have stepped up their play as of late in their first season where post-season play in the GAC has been heavy on the team's mind. Pride has reached double figures in three straight games with her best performance coming in a 17-point performance this past Saturday against Harding. Pride made multiple plays down the stretch and along with Isaac, who is averaging just shy of 13 points a game in her past four games, showed a lot of emotion as both players finally have the opportunity to make it to the GAC tournament in their final seasons as a Lady Ranger.

This weekend's road trip into Arkansas will pit the Lady Rangers against two teams they previously defeated earlier in the season. The first team up will be Arkansas-Monticello (5-8, 8-9 in GAC) whom Northwestern defeated back on Dec. 3 by a final total of 69-55. The Weevils are coming off of a big win over Southeastern this past Saturday, and have been much improved since the Lady Rangers first faced them. The Weevils have jumped up into the fourth spot in the scoring defense category of the GAC (66.0 points allowed), and are paced by guard Ayesha Wahid and forward Treasure Evans, who currently rank 14^th and 15^th in the conference in scoring averaging 12.4 and 12.1 points a game respectively.

The Rangers will then head to Magnolia to take on the Muleriders of Southern Arkansas (5-12, 3-10 in GAC), who have struggled this season and have made some alterations in their attack since the last time the Lady Rangers squared off with them. Accroding to coach Diesselhorst the Muleriders have been known as a historically zone-orientated team, but have made some alterations to their defense in the recent games.

Thursday's contest against Arkansas-Monticello will tip-off at 5:30 p.m. and Saturday's will get underway at 1:00 p.m. against Southern Arkansas.