It’s a battle for sole possession of second place in the Southland Conference match up between Abilene Christian (16-8, 10-2) and Stephen F. Austin (19-4, 10-2) Thursday night. Each team has six games remaining on its schedule, and the winner will move just a half a game behind red-hot Central Arkansas, which has won 10 straight and sits comfortably at 12-2 in Southland play.

While it might not be a must-win Saturday night either, a loss would put the Wildcats a full game back from first with no head-to-head match ups with SFA or UCA remaining after Thursday.

In the previous meeting between the Ladyjacks and the Wildcats, SFA pulled out a 70-61 victory as it limited the Wildcats to the worst first-half performance on the season with ACU only recording 15 points before the intermission. ACU would fight back in the second half, getting as close as five points with 20 seconds remaining, but it could not get enough to fall their way to finish off the comeback as they fell just short.

Stephen F. Austin is on a two-game winning streak, with one of those wins coming over Lamar who sits in fourth place behind these two teams at 18-6 on the season and 11-3 in conference.

ACU rebounded after a tough loss against UCA and is coming off a dominating win over Northwestern State, who they play one more time on Feb. 18.

UCA has four games remaining on its schedule with all of them, except Stephen F. Austin, having them highly favored. The clock is almost up for ACU and SFA on trying to move up at this point. In what will more than likely be the deciding game for second place in conference, unless SFA can pull out a win over UCA. Even then, the winner in this one will need an upset over UCA to take over first place.