The 2011-12 Ashland women’s basketball season has been one to remember. Currently ranked No. 4 in the nation, the team has won 26 straight games and shows no signs of slowing down. Over the next week and a half, the Eagles will play host to the Great Lakes Intercollegiate Athletic Association and NCAA Midwest Regional tournaments.

These are games that should be savored and remembered by everyone in the Ashland community. Remember the great plays. Remember the high fives. Remember the milestones. Most of all, savor the moments that make this team so much fun to watch.

As I sat along press row with about seven minutes remaining until the opening tipoff of Ashland’s GLIAC quarterfinal game against Northern Michigan, something made me turn my head. There was a commotion underneath the basket where the Eagles were warming up, clear across the gym from where I was sitting.

The team was conducting a shooting drill. As the women rotated through the drill, passing balls from underneath the basket and taking shots from inside the lane, the women were shouting at each other.

“That just fires us up,” junior guard Lindsay Tenyak said after the game. “If we get talking that gets everybody talking, that gets everybody just pumped up for the game.”

The yells of encouragement could be heard throughout the gym.

“I think they do that purposefully,” head coach Sue Ramsey said. “They want to be as loud as they can because they want heads turning.”

I have never before heard a team so vocal before the tipoff, especially in the moments leading up to a big game. Most players warm up in silence, only giving an occasional high-five to a teammate as they go over in their head what needs to be done once the game starts.

It was just one of many examples of the closeness of this team.

“We communicate off the court, on the court, in the classroom every day of our lives,” sophomore guard Alyssa Miller said. “If we’re not communicating, then we know something’s wrong.”

Whatever works, ladies.