SHEPHERDSTOWN – Both Shepherd basketball teams are in the final week of the regular season. And both entered the week in seventh place in the 12-school league.

The men’s and women’s teams will each qualify for the 10-team Mountain East Conference tournament, which will be played from March 6 through March 10 in Wheeling this year.

With a 74-69 loss at Charleston last Saturday, the Shepherd men had a 9-11 conference record and were 13-13 overall. Thomas Lang had 23 points for the Rams and surpassed the 1,000-point plateau, now with 1,013 points going into this past Wednesday’s home game against Glenville State. The Rams close out the regular season tomorrow at Fairmont State. Charleston was 23-for-26 at the free throw line and the Rams were five-for-nine.

Shepherd defeated homestanding West Virginia State, 87-86, on Feb. 21 to keep its hopes alive for a winning season. Lang had 25 points and Derek McKnight added 23 points. In that one, Shepherd made 24-of-34 free throws and the Yellow Jackets went 11-for-16 from the foul line. The Shepherd women suffered setbacks on a two-game trip to the southern part of the state.

West Virginia State topped the Rams, 79-63, in Institute and then Charleston ran away to a 91-51 win last Saturday.

Shepherd, missing leading scorer Sydney Clayton, had lost six straight after falling hard at Charleston.

Similar to the men’s team, the women played league-leading Glenville at the Butcher Center just this past Wednesday and travel to Fairmont to see the Fighting Falcons on Saturday.

The record, following six consecutive losses, was 11-15 overall and 8-12 in the Mountain East Conference.

Nationally ranked West Liberty is the conference pace-setter in the men’s ranks with twice-beaten Glenville sailing along in front of the pack in the women’s division.