Southeast Missouri’s women’s basketball team has the advantage of hosting its final three games of the regular season, and the Otahkians need just one win to host a first-round tournament game.

“You play your conference season so you can get into the conference tournament,” head coach Ed Arnzen said. “It’s an important advantage, and we’re looking forward to be able to host.”

While Eastern (1-12) travels to SEMO (8-5) Saturday for its final road game of the season, the Panthers and Otahkians both host Eastern Kentucky and Morehead State next weekend to wrap up the conference season.

“We have played well at home, but now we have three difficult opponents coming up,” Arnzen said. “The race is getting tight.”

While SEMO needs just one win to host a tournament game, Eastern still holds on to tournament hopes needing two conference wins. After suffering a 77-71 loss to the Otahkians in the first half of OVC play, the Panthers will use the strength of their inside players to match Southeast Missouri’s talent.

“It’s going to be a good ball-game,” Arnzen said. “It was a good ball game at Eastern and it’s going to be another close ball game against two clubs that match up well.”

Leading the Otahkians are junior center Pam Iversen and sophomore forward Lori Chase.

“They are two excellent inside players,” Arnzen said. “They are much like (Pam) O’Connor and (Angie) Russell and we go to them a lot on offense and they also are our two top rebounders, so they help us defensively.”

Iversen finished 6-of-6 from the field and 8-of-9 from the foul line against Tennessee-Martin Saturday to finish with 20 points and 8 rebounds. Chase combined for 53 points and 28 rebounds against Murray State and Martin while notching her fifth double-double against conference leader Tennessee-Tech with 21 points and 12 rebounds.

Junior guard Veronica Benson has also emerged as a leader for the Otahkians, reaching a career-best 10 boards against Murray State and a career-high five steals against Martin.

These three players will provide the leadership on the court Saturday against the Panthers, but Eastern will not come to Cape Girardeau, Mo., empty-handed.

“Eastern has two outstanding inside players and two strong guards,” Arnzen said. “Lauren Dailey was someone we tried to recruit here at Southeast Missouri and O’Connor is another strong player.

“Eastern also has (Renee) Schaul, who is just an outstanding three-point shooter.”

While the senior leadership of Schaul and Russell with the new faces of Dailey and O’Connor will strengthen Eastern’s squad, Southeast Missouri will be determined to secure its place as a host for the OVC tournament.

“We don’t want to back into the tournament,” Arnzen said. “We want to gain momentum.

`We have Eastern and then Eastern Kentucky before we finish up with Morehead,” he said. “We want to go out winning and not just capture this home berth because someone else lost.”