As the season winds down for the K-State volleyball team, positioning in the Big 12 Conference becomes more and more important.

The Wildcats will have another tough match when they face Iowa State at 7 p.m. Saturday at Ahearn Field House.

K-State is coming off a sweep of Missouri that moved its Big 12 record to 8-4 this season and put the Wildcats into fourth place in the league standings.

"One of our goals every year as a team, as a program, is to try and be in the top three of the conference," coach Suzie Fritz said. "To do that we need to win a good majority of the rest of them." With Iowa State sitting in fifth with a 7-4 league record, the match holds Big 12 implications.

The Wildcats had one of their strongest road showings of the season last time they met up with the Cyclones as they pulled a sweep in Ames, Iowa.

This time around, Fritz said her team will keep a similar game plan to counter the Cyclones' spontaneous attack.

"I felt like we played good defense, which is what we needed to do against an Iowa State team, because they play hard on defense, they dig a lot of balls and they play really spontaneous," Fritz said. "There are a lot of unexpected events - I felt like we were prepared for those things last time."

K-State has upcoming matches against Nebraska at home and Texas on the road that will be important to the Wildcats' final standing in the league.

But Fritz said her team is not peeking ahead.

"I don't think further ahead than tomorrow, so I haven't even put 3 minutes of thought into Nebraska or Texas," Fritz said. "At this point right now we are consumed with Iowa State and concerned about them."

With the season entering its home stretch, Fritz said the Wildcats can't afford to relax.

"At this point in the season it's important to put a good performance together against everybody," Fritz said.

"We don't have the luxury of getting a break from here on."