The CWU women’s soccer team has started off with a 1-4-2 record and they are looking to improve on this as they host number one ranked Western Washington University (WWU) on Thursday, Sept. 28.

The Wildcats are coming into Thursday’s game coming off of a tough 4-2 loss to Simon Fraser University. They were shorthanded for more than half of the match after Kylee Dillon was given a red card during minute 38.

Freshmen Sophia Keenan is second on the team in goals with two and tied for second in points with five.

“It’s very important [the game against WWU], but I feel that every game is important, especially since we’re starting league,” Keenan said. “We just need to come with the same mentality for every game. Come in there and be confident and ready to play, and make sure we’re playing a full 90 minutes.”

This will be Keenan’s first time facing the rival WWU.

“I have a couple of friends on that team and I’m excited to compete with them,” Keenan said. “It’s just like any other league game, you need to come out with the same mentality for any game and be ready to play, and it’ll be a good game.”

Senior Mackenzie Nolte leads the team in points with 13 and in goals with six. Nolte has five goals in the last three games.

“The game against Western is important that we come out with confidence, and play as a team, how we have been practicing to play,” Nolte said. “They are number one in the nation, like we should play them as hard as we would anybody else and try and keep that out of our minds, though we wanna win. We’re just gonna give it our all, and it’s important, but it’s not everything.”

Now the Wildcats only have GNAC games left for the remainder of the season.

“If anything, I think that’s the most important thing for us, is to look forward and make sure we’re winning the games that we need to,” Nolte said.

This will be Nolte’s final time playing in the rivalry game against Western.

There is excitement and motivation “against Western, definitely. I can’t let it get to me, and I think the seniors are thinking the same way,” Nolte said. “We know they’re good, but we know we’re also good. So we can compete with them, but definitely there’s some excitement. I would love to beat them.”

GNAC play for the Wildcats will be important in getting a postseason berth.

“We had the dream start last year in terms of non-conference play and that set us up for the rest of the year,” head coach Michael Farrand said. “We have the nightmare start this year because we didn’t do as well. Now that means conference play is everything for us.”

The top four teams in the GNAC go into the conference playoffs, and whoever wins that will get an automatic bid to the NCAA DII tournament, conference games are important so it’s huge to pick up points, Farrand said.

“You’re playing the national champion, the number one team in the country, number one team in the region,” Farrand said. “We’re gonna look at that result just for what it is, we’re gonna go play the best team right now, and we want a result.”

Rivalry games tend to add more excitement.

“Thursday, I would come, that’s the best team in the country right now, we should put a thousand people out here,” Farrand said.

CWU will host Western on Thursday, WWU holds a 31-game win streak, and a 32-game undefeated streak.

Then CWU will head out and pay a visit to Saint Martin’s University on Saturday, Sept. 30 and Northwest Nazarene University on Oct. 5.