By RYAN SHUMAKER
Sports Editor
Both men and women’s basketball teams had disappointing results when each team lost both of their games over the weekend.
For the men’s side, the two losses could not have come at a worse time, as now they must win one of their final two games or have a whole host of tiebreakers work out in their favor in order to make the conference tournament.
Last Thursday the Rangers lost to the last place team in the conference, Oklahoma Baptist University, 87-82.
The Bison came out and shot a blistering 67 percent from the field and jumped out to a 52-38 half-time lead.
The Rangers clawed their way back into the game in the second half behind 15 points from junior Adrian Motley and some key 3-point buckets from guard Deiondray Martin.
The second half resurgence was in full effect when Martin hit a three-point shot with 11:09 left on the clock, closing the Bison lead down to 11 points.
The Rangers continued on to outscore the Bison 21-12 in the next ten minutes of the ballgame before the Bison ultimately closed out the win.
Motley along with seniors T’aries Taylor and Lakeem Henderson all reached double-digit scoring for the Rangers while point guard Brandon Green produced his usual quality stat line with nine points, seven rebounds and four assists.
The following Saturday the Rangers dropped a road contest to East Central University, 81-62. East Central jumped out to an early 15-1 lead in the first five minutes of the ballgame and never looked back.
The closest the Rangers narrowed the lead to was eight points, but the Tigers shut-down of Ranger’s leading scorer Motley was evident.
The second half wouldn’t prove much different as the Rangers continued to struggle on the offensive side of the ball and ended up playing a few players at the end of the game that haven’t seen much playing time all year.
Motley was held to his lowest scoring total of the year and the Rangers gave up 46 points in the paint while only scoring 26 of their own.
The women’s basketball team wouldn’t fair much better as they dropped both contests, which leaves them with only two more opportunities to get their first conference win of the year.
The Ranger’s lost 78-53 against Oklahoma Baptist University and 71-46 to East Central University.
Juniors Ashley Pride, Kamera Bozeman and Jonae Issac led the way in scoring against Oklahoma Baptist with 11 points each. Hinton, Okla. native Kaci Hansen provided a solid stat line against East Central with 10 points and seven rebounds against the Tigers.
Both teams will finish off the season with two road games this weekend against Ouachita Baptist on Thursday and then Henderson State on Saturday.