PHOENIX - The Arizona softball team found out the hard way this past weekend what it means to be the top-ranked team in the country.

Before Saturday's game with Mississippi State and yesterday's game against Wisconsin, Arizona was listed as the nation's premier team, while the other two schools found themselves somewhere near the middle of the pack.

MSU's team was young and inexperienced with a total of two seniors. Wisconsin was coming off of two shutout losses against Top 25 opponents

An hour before Saturday's game against Arizona, the Bulldogs exhibited a demeanor uncharacteristic of a team about to face the defending national champions, cheering and whooping it up. Two hours later, they looked more like the premier team and less like little girls in pigtails.

Being the No. 1 team in the country has its disadvantages at times. No matter who the opponent is, when a team has one shot at beating Arizona, they bring their best stuff to the table.

Arizona's two losses were no exception as Mississippi State threw its ace senior Kasey Whitehead and Wisconsin threw its best hurler in junior Andrea Kirchberg.

Whitehead kept the Wildcats off balance all game, throwing just the right mixture of rise balls and knucklers - including a wicked one that froze Arizona sophomore designated player Leneah Manuma for a called strike - three at a time when the Wildcats needed to start a late-inning rally.

Kirchberg did much the same yesterday, sending 10 Wildcats back to the bench after striking them out.

While Kirchberg came in with a respectable mark of 22-13 a year ago, Whitehead was coming off of 4-5 mark last year. That's right - the staff ace had a sub-.500 record.

But that wasn't what mattered on Saturday. What mattered was that her team was taking on a squad that has won six national titles, and they wanted to come up big - and come up big they did.

As sophomore center fielder Iyhia McMichael put away the final out, Whitehead pointed to the sky as if to say, 'thanks.' Maybe she did get some help from above, but Arizona did its part to help her out.

After drubbing No. 10 Cal State Fullerton in its first game of the day, Arizona came into the MSU game looking tired and sluggish. A three-hour game against CSFU didn't help, but still, these girls are conditioned to play in these kinds of situations. The Wildcats failed to will their bodies to work harder though and left eight runners on base against the Bulldogs.

Yesterday was no different as Arizona could not muster any offense against Wisconsin after a lackluster hitting performance in the day's previous game against Massachusetts.

While fatigue undoubtedly played a factor in both losses, the bottom line came down to a lack of hunger for the Wildcats.

Both Mississippi State and Wisconsin proved they wanted to win more.

Arizona has a target on its back right now and head coach Mike Candrea is the only one that seems to realize it.

Showing up isn't enough for this young squad. Candrea said after Sunday's loss that the team had to make the decision to turn the season around. He realizes that this is not a decision he can make for the team - it's one they have to make for themselves.

Schools like Mississippi State and Wisconsin can make their season on a single victory against the Wildcats and Arizona has to realize that.

If the Wildcats fail to bring a high level of intensity to every ball game, they're going to find themselves in the same position they found themselves in this weekend - sitting at home contemplating a loss.

This weekend, Arizona learned that lesson the hard way.