The weather isn’t the only thing that has been warming up lately.

Winners of their last five, prior to Wednesday night’s affair with College of the Canyons, the 12th ranked team in the state is closing in on their second conference championship in the last four years.

The Bakersfield College women’s basketball team (20-4 overall, 9-3 Western State Conference – South) were one game behind conference-leading and then state 20th-ranked Santa Monica (17-9, 8-4 WSC), but a showdown between the two on Feb. 11 kept the race for first place up for grabs.

In the previous meeting between the two at Gil Bishop, it was all Santa Monica. The Corsairs forced BC to shoot a conference team-low 27.5 percent (19-for-69) from the field and season-low 11.8 percent (2-for-17) from downtown, giving the Renegades their only double-digit loss this season 73-52.

“It was a very lackluster game,” head coach Paula Dahl said. “They put the screws to us and we panicked and we didn’t react and respond. This game I think they’re pretty determined to not have that happen again.”

Sure enough, that was ultimately the case.

Four of the five BC starters combined for 61 of the team’s 72 total points, including Nakia Page’s 22 points, Marissa Jones’ 14 points and 11 rebounds, Claesey Tarver’s 13 points, and lastly Khiylah Dean’s 12 points.

Although Santa Monica had three of their starters in double-figures, the Corsairs shot their own conference team-low 24.4 percent from the field (20-for-82) falling just short of Bakersfield, 72-69.

The Renegades finally capped off their success on the road in Glendale on Feb. 14 with a date against the Vaqueros (16-11, 6-6 WSC).

The Renegades were defeated by the Vaqueros in the first meeting at Gil Bishop 69-65, but despite it being Valentine’s Day, there was no love given to Glendale as Bakersfield clinched its 20th win of the season (the first 20 or more win season since 2006).

Bakersfield jumped out to a 34-27 lead at half forcing 16 Glendale turnovers and just eight field goals made.

“We pressed all 40 minutes,” Dahl said. “It was a great game.”

The Renegades led by as many 29 points and 29 of their 75 points came off of Glendale’s 28 total turnovers as BC cruised to their largest conference win, 75-57.

Page and Tarver both finished with 16 points each while McKaiela Tyler tied her season high with 14 of her own (4-4 3-pt FG).

After a 6-1 conference road record, the Renegades have played one of its final two games at home vs. Canyons (updated story and standings on www.therip.com/sports) and Antelope Valley (15-11, 8-4 WSC) remains with possibly a WSC Championship at stake on Feb. 21 at 5 p.m. here at Gil Bishop Sports Center.