Editor's note: Ball State's Amy Zercher and Tamara Bowie will share a weekly diary with ESPN.com throughout the season. This week, Zercher tips off the diary with a look at Ball State's bright future.

Jan. 15, 2001

Hello! As the Mid-American Conference season is now in full swing, the Ball State women's basketball team continues to ride the wave of momentum and sends out a warning: Ball State is a team of the future -- a team that cannot be overlooked anymore.

	Sophomore guard Amy Zercher and Ball State are the team to beat in the MAC.

We enter our second season with Brenda Oldfield ("Coach O" to the players) calling the shots. Last year, in her first year at Ball State, our team blistered the record books by setting 14 different school records. The same holds true this season as all of us continue to strive for the ultimate -- a Mid-American Conference Championship.

Coach O's passion for the game continues to amaze me. All of our coaches (Tracy Roller, Marsha Frese and Brad Taylor) go the extra distance to ensure that we are the best that we can be. Our contact is not restricted only to the court, but we also have a great time with them off the court, too! That makes a world of difference.

Our record entering this week -- 12-3 overall and 4-0 in the MAC -- matches the best in the 26-year history of the program. Of our three losses, only one was to a team that we felt was better than us. But hey, we took that loss and used it as a stepping stone to take us to another level. We learned from it, so in retrospect, it wasn't the end of the world, although it sure did feel like it then.

Our team is finally becoming real competitors this year, something we lacked last year. The coaches challenged us on that aspect over the summer and it is clear we all accepted the challenge.

The MAC season has been going for about two weeks now and it has been an absolute blast! We are playing some awesome basketball right now. Just last week, we beat the defending MAC West Division champ, Western Michigan, 94-68 on the road. Then, on Saturday, we beat Northern Illinois, another West Division foe that was previously unbeaten in conference play, 78-54 in front of our largest home crowd yet -- nearly 1,500 people.

Right now we sit atop the West Division in sole possession of first place. What a great feeling! I also learned today that we received votes in the Associated Press Top 25 poll to rank 38th in the nation! That's a real credit to everyone in our program. Ball State women's basketball is a program skyrocketing to the top. I hope many people decide to take the ride with us.

Amy