PIEDMONT -- It has been awhile since Neelyville lost. It has been a long time since it lost an Ozark Foothills Conference game. It has been 11 years since it lost an OFC Tournament game.
The Lady Tigers face their latest challenger in Twin Rivers in the OFC Tournament championship at 6:30 p.m. Friday at the Bess Activity Center at Three Rivers College.
The start time is subject to change with ice forecasted for Tuesday night.
Including the tournament, Neelyville has won 33 straight OFC games. The Lady Tigers have also won 10 straight OFC Tournaments and beat Twin Rivers twice this year, by 25 points in the Lady Royals Classic and by 47 points in a regular season game at Neelyville.
"Our second performance was obviously not as good as our first, or maybe they played so much stronger," Twin Rivers coach Kelly Westerfield said. "Whichever way you want to look at it. We are going to have to play physically strong, mentally strong, from the time the ball is tipped to the final buzzer.
"We have no room for error."
Twin Rivers (15-8, 7-1 OFC) and Neelyville (19-4, 8-0) last met in the final in 2013, when the Lady Tigers won by a point. Westerfield still blames herself for that loss.
Twin Rivers was the top seed then, an eventual district champion anchored by senior center Tori Cole.
The Lady Royals were ahead a point with 10 seconds left with Neelyville inbounding the ball under its own basket. Westerfield put Cole on the ball to make it hard to get the pass in. Neelyville got the pass in to freshman Shelby Moon near center court, and she raced to the basket for the go-ahead bucket.
In hindsight, Westerfield said she should have put Cole back under the basket because that Lady Royals team didn't have a lot of speed.
Twin Rivers last won the OFC tournament in 2002.
"They tell me they want to, and what is going to make the difference is if they have that desire and that will to push themselves under the pressure," Westerfield said.
In both games this season between Twin Rivers and Neelyville, the Lady Royals struggled with turnovers.
Neelyville forced 24 turnovers in the Lady Royal Classic and allowed eight points over the first 10 minutes to take a 15 point lead.
Neelyville later went on a 13-2 run to open the second half and take a 28 point lead, its biggest of the game.
Jentri Worley led Neelyville in that game with 29 points and Autumn Dodd had 20 while Twin Rivers' Katelyn South had 16 points.
Five weeks later, The Lady Tigers dominated from the start with a 14-1 run to open the game. Westerfield called a pair of timeouts in the first four minutes to pull her team together, but the Lady Tigers kept rolling.
Neelyville outscored Twin Rivers by at least 14 points in each of the first three quarters. Worley led the team with 20 points while South had seven for Twin Rivers.