There are moments -- fleeting as they may seem -- when Lisa Stone feels the disappointment.

Getting a glimpse of those occasions is difficult, because Stone, a glass-half-full kind of person, quickly moves on.

Less than a week after her University of Wisconsin women's basketball team's season ended with a loss to Villanova in the second round of the Women 's National Invitation Tournament, the Badgers' coach was talking about the group of freshmen she has coming in next year and the offseason remodeling job she has planned for her team's defense.

"I don't get caught up in the negative. I don't," Stone said. "I want to practice already for next year."

The aim next year for the Badgers will be to reach the NCAA tournament for the first time since the 2001-02 season. Many thought UW, picked to finish second in the Big Ten Conference in the preseason by the league's coaches and third by the media, would end that drought this season behind senior guards Jolene Anderson -- who became the program's all-time leading scorer this year -- and Janese Banks.

It didn't happen and the Badgers endured an up-and-down season, finishing 16-14 overall and 9-9 in Big Ten play, good for a tie for seventh place.

"I would say it's disappointing not only from the athletic department standpoint, but for the student-athletes, because you always want to end with what you think your predicted potential is," said UW associate athletic director Terry Gawlik, who oversees the women 's basketball program and called reaching the NCAA tournament "everyone's goal."

When asked if she believes Stone is the person to take the program forward toward that goal, Gawlik said, "I think she can."

Gawlik said she couldn't comment on whether Stone would return for her sixth season -- her contract runs through May 2011 -- because the athletic department was in the process of conducting its coaching evaluations. That process will be completed by the UW athletic board's May 2 meeting.

"Our standard answer is we're in the process of doing the evaluation right now," Gawlik said.

The nine conference wins were the most for UW since the 2000-01 season, although the league schedule expanded from 16 to 18 games this year. Stone points to the improved records in Big Ten play -- the Badgers were 4-12 in 2003-04, her first year; 5-11 the next two years; and 7-9 last year -- and the increase in the talent level on the team over her five seasons as signs of progress.

"We have steadily gotten better," said Stone, who has compiled a 72-78 record (30-52 in Big Ten) at UW. "Even this year. We improved this year. Our strength of schedule was better, our RPI was better, our conference finish, 9-9 in the league was better, the best it's been in a long time. ...

"People don't see that. They see that we lost to Villanova. Look at the big picture. We are making progress, we are heading in the right direction. The players know that."

And Stone, who isn't anticipating any offseason changes on her staff, believes her bosses feel the same way.

"The administration's behind me a hundred percent," she said. "They really are, they really are. They've seen the tough breaks we had this year. They see the progress of the program."

Gawlik said she thinks the program is making progress "in general."

"I wish that we would have been a bit more successful, particularly for some of the student-athletes -- it would've been nice to get in the NCAAs for Jolene and Janese and those guys," she said. "But I think in general (we are)."