Central’s volleyball team lost their first three games of the season during the Concordia University volleyball tournament, but since then, have reeled off six straight wins.

The Wildcats entered their conference campaign with a 4-3 record and dominated both Northwest Nazarene (3-1) and Montana State Billings (3-0).

Central’s goals have not changed much from last season, even though they don’t have as many seniors.

“We want to have a winning record, and we want to be on top of the GNAC again,” Kaitlin Quirk, senior middle blocker, said. “We want to continue this streak of being on top of the GNAC, like we have the past four years.”

Even though the Wildcats only have five seniors returning, head coach Mario Andaya feels that they have enough depth to be a top team in the GNAC.

“We got a lot of kids on the team, we got a lot of depth, so I like it,”  Andaya said. “It’s tough to play everybody, but at the same time when you have that opportunity where there is some depth and everybody is on the same page, then you’re hard to prepare for,”

Central lost their first conference game on Thursday, 2-3, to rivals Western Washington University. The Wildcats are now 6-4 overall with a 2-1 conference record.

Going into Thursday’s game the team felt they had prepared well, but knew they would have to go the distance.

“I think that we came in with good preparation, but it’s never the same when you come in live,” Andaya said. “It’s always been like this, we went to five games last year and we were on the upper hand of that game. With two good teams like this there is always a chance of it going the distance.”

Despite making a comeback late in the game, the Wildcats fell short in extra points.

“We played it really well, it was a well fought battle going five games in and going into extra points. We have each others backs through anything and everything and we’re always ready to help each other,” senior setter Katie Fry said.

The Wildcats just made a few more mistakes than Western which gave the Vikings the victory.

“We hung in there with them the whole time, they just made a few less mistakes than us,”

The Wildcats begin October at Western Oregon and Concordia University.