UC Riverside comes to the Pavilion at 7 pm Thursday to tangle with the Aggies. The Ags are coming off their second loss this season to Long Beach State and will have their hands full with the Highlanders. UCR is currently in a tie for first place in the Big West and are led by Rejane Verin who leads the league with a 17.1 ppg average. The Highlanders are also the best rebounding team in the league an area in which the Aggies have struggled all season.

In an Enterprise article Coach Jen Gross said that the Ags were disappointed with their loss at Long Beach after they let a 9 point 4th quarter lead slip away. Gross said that the Ags got "passive" and had some critical, unforced errors late. She said the loses to Long Beach were not from a lack of effort though.

That said, the Ags will need to ramp up the effort to maintain their focus and learn to be the aggressor in tight games. They have lost a couple of games this year that were winnable if they had matched their opponent's assertiveness instead of getting set back on their heels and then getting tentative which led to mistakes.

This is a young team and there is a long way to go before the Big West Tournament. The Aggies want to be peaking and playing with confidence by the time the tourney begins. Jen Gross will be looking to see if her Aggies will heed her advice about what they need to do better in order to play well for a full 40 minutes against good teams. The game against UCR is a good place to start.

Live stream for those who can't make it out to the Pavilion: http://www.bigwest.org/tv/

Go Ags!