Women’s Basketball season came to an end March 1 after a tough 73-75 loss to Montana State University Billings (MSUB) in the first round of the GNAC tournament.

Point guard Jasmin Edwards played a key role for the Wildcats this season. As a senior, Edwards is the all-time assists leader at CWU and will be leaving the Wildcats as one of the most decorated athletes in CWU Women’s Basketball history.

After the departure of previous head coach Jeff Harada, the Wildcats implemented a new coaching staff this season with the likes of head coach Randi Richardson-Thornley, as well as assistant coach Hillary Carlson and graduate assistant Stacey Lukasiewicz.

“We had a whole system to learn from,” Edwards said. “We became a different team over the course of the season from where we started to where we ended.”   

Edwards emphasized the potential that this team has and said that it was still a successful season considering the changes that were made to the team.

“There’s always room for improvement,” Edwards said. “When we compete, we can beat anybody in the conference.”

Guard Alexis Pana came up strong for the Wildcats this year. In only her second year with the team as a sophomore, Pana pushed herself into a starting role for the Wildcats and proved herself to have a significant impact on the court.

This bodes well for the future of the Wildcats as Pana and others hope to come up big for the Wildcats next season.

“Our team really came together this year,” Pana said. “I feel like whatever our seniors set and the footsteps that they left behind, we have to build off of that.”

Forward Taylor Baird is another senior alongside Edwards who performed consistently at a high level in her final season as a Wildcat. Baird said that the returners on the team need to use their loss to MSUB as motivation for next season.

The Wildcats may not have reached their ultimate goal to be GNAC champions this season, but there’s still a lot to be said about the team’s growth over the course of the season.

“Our confidence as a team overall grew so much and that was one of the big things that we wanted to focus on,” Baird said. “We won a lot of games… We accomplished a lot of things.”

With five seniors on the team this year, the Wildcats are going to have a new look moving forward, but Edwards said that the team is in a great position to continue to reach new heights in the GNAC.

“I think that Central is highly underrated… and I think people are still underestimating Central,” Edwards said. “We’re here to compete with the best teams in the GNAC and we absolutely can.”