Two seasons ago, Stephen F. Austin players and coaches vividly recall how they found out their year was done. It was in a similar fashion to how many teams found out – suddenly.

Kayla Scott, the team’s director of basketball operations, headed down the stairs of William R. Johnson Coliseum toward the court to where the team was, and everyone could sense that something was wrong. They were in the middle of practice before heading off to the Southland Tournament in Katy, Texas. SFA had just finished second in the regular season but were feeling confident of making a title run.

Head coach Mark Kellogg presumed that athletic director Ryan Ivey tried to get a hold of him but couldn’t, so Scott broke the news to the team in the middle of the last practice: the tournament was canceled.

“We didn’t know what that meant because we would have gone to the WNIT if that was the case, it was almost wait-and-see,” Kellogg recalled. “We met with them a couple hours later, met again with them. And then I think by the next morning, they had just kind of shut the whole thing down.”

And that was it.

The Lady Jacks never got the chance to avenge their loss in the SLC title game the year prior, and just like that, the careers of seniors Kennedy Harris and Riley Harvey were over.

“I just saw them in tears,” junior all-conference guard Stephanie Visscher said. “And that just broke me because I know how much they wanted it, especially for the last year and how much we wanted to put them there last year.”

Visscher’s father, in all the way from their home in Sweden and ready to travel with the team, looked on from the stands. Having him there was a comfort for Visscher, but also bittersweet that his trip was now seemingly in vain.