There was everything to play for between Mississippi State and Texas A&M in College Station on Thursday. The Aggies came in a team on the rise, winning four of their last five to claw into the NCAA Tournament conversation. The Bulldogs arrived as visitors, slipping out of the March Madness conversation, losing back-to-back games against Florida and No. 4 Texas.

The stakes were made clear on the ESPN broadcast, showing odds of better than 70% to make the tournament should the Bulldogs win, and just 44% with a loss.

The game lived up to the stakes, going down to the wire as the Aggies pulled away, 68-64 winners.

It’s the nature of the SEC, in women’s basketball especially, that any team can win on a given night. The Aggies turned that into momentum and put themselves in position to extend their season into March. The Bulldogs risk watching from home.

“We’re all beating each other up, and you’ve got to have hope,” MSU head coach Sam Purcell said on MSU radio after the game. “I hurt for my kids right now, they had two great practices. That’s what I asked of them, to have a great attitude and keep fighting, and they did. To not finish that fourth quarter hurts, I burned every timeout because you could feel it; there was nothing left in the tank there.”

The Bulldogs led by five going into the fourth quarter. A 19-point performance by freshman Madison Francis helped put them in front on the road, but the Aggies fought back hard in the final frame. The hosts held MSU to a four-minute scoring drought to end the game, and missed free throws came back to bite the visitors as the margins shrank.

“We had moments we were up four with four to go, a chance to get it up six, eight. That’s where those free throws come in, you seize the moment and don’t give them hope, don’t allow them back in. When you miss those free throws… they feel the momentum, they feel the opportunity. You have to tip your hat. They made the plays in the fourth quarter, and we didn’t.”

The Bulldogs twice got the deficit back down to three in the final minute, slowing the game down with strong defense and fouls. Francis and Nwaedozi even doubled their possessions with a key steal and offensive rebound, respectively, but attempts from beyond the arc by Trayanna Crisp and Chandler Prater failed to find the mark.

Like Francis, Prater was a player who showed up in the second half. She finished with 13 points, nine rebounds, four assists and four steals while playing 35 minutes off the bench.

“She had a look and demeanor that she didn’t want to lose the game,” Purcell said. “We rode her coattails. The bottom line is that, as much as she provided, the team let up in the end there on team defense, and that’s the hard part to swallow tonight.”

MSU still has a chance to boost its resume against No. 6 LSU at home on Sunday, or mount a charge through the SEC tournament next week, but the Bulldogs know they let an opportunity slip away on Thursday night.

“It’s hard, these kids have been fighting and giving us everything they got,” Purcell said. “It’s a quiet locker room. Obviously, there’s tears, they’re frustrated, we’re all frustrated because I thought we had a hell of a game plan, and this was a game we could win. Now it’s about playing for your seniors on Senior Night, finishing this regular season strong, not putting your head down and going to the SEC and trying to make a run.”

MSU and LSU tipoff Sunday at 3 p.m. The game will be televised on SEC Network.