SIUE's Amy Austin finished her playing career and now looks toward a career in the classroom.

Our hopes of making the conference tournament and continuing on with the season depended upon whether we won our last regular season game. Emotions were running high as we took the floor, but luckily it was in our favor that we had plenty of energy to last the entire 40 minutes and nothing less, as we sometimes tend to play. Not only was it the last game at home for me as a senior, but the rest of the team too, as the gym will be completely renovated to gear up for the move to Division I.

Good news...we won! It was a great way to end my career, but because we won we got the opportunity to advance to the conference tournament. Our entire team was ecstatic to continue playing and the possibility of winning the Great Lakes Valley Conference. Unfortunately, our first game against Northern Kentucky was exactly the way we've played all season.

We had a great practice and warm-up and it showed on the court. We were leading most of the game and playing great defense until around the 10-minute mark when we scored our last points of the game. We were shut down in every aspect of our offense and didn't score again. We had the game within our reach and couldn't finish. The same scenario seems to have been on repeat for many, many games. We seem to play for 25-30 minutes and have a breakdown, which is what happened.

It's been a busy couple of weeks since our loss, trying to transition into a prospective teacher! Between switching student teaching assignments, perfecting my resume, and filling out job applications, I'm sure I will be in full anticipation as to where I will be able to teach next school year. Of course I can't help but watch all the basketball either. It's March Madness!!