CONWAY — With only two games remaining in the regular season and the Southland Conference women's basketball tournament on the horizon next week, there are still numerous seeding possibilities at play for Central Arkansas as the Sugar Bears enter the final week before their first-ever postseason appearance in NCAA Division I.
Currently sitting in a fourth-place tie in the league standings, in order to move up the Sugar Bears need a win on Wednesday night in the final home game of the season – which may also be one of the toughest.
In their last appearance of the season in the Farris Center, the Sugar Bears (17-10, 9-5 Southland) take on the UTSA Roadrunners (14-13, 10-4) – the West Division leaders and a team UCA has never beaten – at 7 p.m.
The Roadrunners lead the series 4-0, wining 71-66 last season in San Antonio and 97-89 in overtime in Conway two years ago. The Sugar Bears, winners of their last two with victories over Nicholls and Southeastern Louisiana last week, will be looking to continue their winning ways and break through against UTSA and better position themselves for the third seed in next week's tournament in Katy, Texas.
Entering the final week of action, McNeese State leads the Southland with a 13-1 record and Lamar trailing close behind at 12-2. The Cowgirls and Lady Cardinals will meet Saturday in Lake Charles, La. in the last game of the regular season in a game that could decide the conference championship and top seed in the tournament.
Regardless of how it plays out, those two teams will have the top two seeds in the tournament. With the next five teams – UTSA, Sam Houston State, UCA, Northwestern State and Stephen F. Austin – clustered together with conference records between 10-4 and 8-6, a lot remains to be determined with the rest of the seeding.
A win on Wednesday would give the Sugar Bears the tiebreaker over the Roadrunners with each team having one game remaining. The Sugar Bears finish the regular season at Texas A&M-Corpus Christi, which is 2-25 overall and 0-14 in the league. UTSA finishes at home against UT Arlington, one of the four teams still alive for the eighth and final spot with a league record of 4-10.
Even with a win against the Roadrunners, the Sugar Bears would need to defeat the Islanders on Saturday and hope for Sam Houston State – also 9-5 in the league – to slip one more time in order for UCA to assume the third seed. The Bearkats host SFA on Wednesday and finish at Texas State on Saturday.
A loss would drop the Sugar Bears to six in conference play. Both SFA and Northwestern State have six losses entering Wednesday's games, but play each other in the regular season finale. The Sugar Bears own the tiebreaker over both teams and even with two losses would only be able to drop beneath one in tournament seeding.
Two games and four possible seeds, 3-6, remain.
It starts with a UTSA team that has won its last three, including its last two by 48 points. The Roadrunners defeated Texas State 81-64 in San Antonio on Saturday and last Wednesday had a convincing 93-62 rout of the Islanders in Corpus Christi. UTSA's last loss came at McNeese State on Feb. 16, a 72-43 defeat.
The Roadrunners have three players averaging double figures in scoring, led by senior guard Amber Gregg's 14.3 points per game. Junior guard Ashley Gardner, who played at North Little Rock and Arkansas Baptist College, is second on the team at 11.3 points per game. Junior forward Ashleigh Franklin is third at 10.5 points per game and leads the Roadrunners with 8.3 rebounds per game. UTSA's second-leading rebounder and the league's leading shot blocker is 6-1 senior guard Alysse Davis, who averages 8.4 points, 6.3 rebounds and 2.6 blocks per game. Davis had 22 points in her last trip to Conway, hitting 6-of-8 from 3-point range in the Roadrunners' win in 2009.
Nakeia Guiden, who had a career-high 22 points in that game, enters Wednesday's game coming off a 21-point outing against Southeastern Louisiana in a game in which she did not miss in six field goal attempts and nine tries from the free throw line.
At 9.9 points per game, Guiden is the Sugar Bears' second leading scorer this season behind sophomore forward Megan Herbert, who continues to lead the league in both scoring (17.7), rebounding (11.4), field goal percentage (57.8), and free throws made (140).
UCA will be gunning for its 12th win in the Farris Center this season, which would make the Sugar Bears 27-5 over the past two seasons. Wednesday's game pits two of the Southland's three most successful programs over the past two seasons, with the Sugar Bears ranking second with 38 wins and UTSA 30 since the start of last season. The Roadrunners have long been a Southland power, having won at least 10 conference games in 10 of the last 11 seasons and have not had a losing record since 1999-2000. They are 131-55 over that span and won back-to-back Southland tournaments in '08 and '09.
It will be the final game in the Farris Center for UCA seniors Megan Moss and Brea Banks. Moss, a 6-3 center from Coolidge, Arizona who transferred from Central Arizona College, has been with the program for three seasons. Banks, a 5-11 forward from West Memphis who transferred in from Moberly Area CC, has been with the team two – though was limited to action in just two games last season due to injury.
