NATCHEZ — Cathedral School’s softball team has made big strides in recent years, getting to the second round of the playoffs the past two seasons.

Now, the Lady Green Wave look to begin their quest to go even deeper into the postseason Friday and Saturday against West Lincoln School.

Cathedral (17-9-1) will travel to Brookhaven Friday to take on West Lincoln before returning to Natchez Saturday to host the Lady Bears.

“We haven’t seen them at all, but I know they’re a young team,” Cathedral coach Gary Blackwell said. “Their coach (Andrew Redd) is kind of on the rebuilding side of things.”

Even though Cathedral might have the advantage in experience, Blackwell warned that his girls couldn’t afford to take the Lady Bears lightly.

“From playing them last year, they were also on that (rebuilding) cycle then, but they’re in the playoffs, and they want to win,” Blackwell said. “Every game is important. We can’t take them lightly.”

With it being Cathedral’s third postseason berth in a row, Blackwell said his girls are hungry to go beyond the second round, where Cathedral has stalled out the last two seasons.

“We basically have the same girls (from those teams) minus two,” he said. “It’s very helpful that they have that experience. This is a very special group of girls. They love the game and love competition.”

They’ll also have to treat every game like it’s the state championship game, if they want to get there, Blackwell said.

“I’ll quote Bobby Cox: If you want to make it to the championship, you have to play every game like it’s the championship,” Blackwell said.

“This group wants to make it to state. That’s their goal, and they’ve worked hard all year. We had a tough schedule, where we only really had two games that we played ‘off.’ All the other losses were close losses. They’ve worked very hard to be the team they are.”

Cathedral’s Saturday matchup with West Lincoln is at 1 p.m.