ROYAL CITY — The Royal High volleyball team is better than in the recent past, but the girls are not quite ready to bump Kiona-Benton from the perch of the mighty in the South Central A Conference East.

With a 2-0 non-league record, the Knights visited the Bears in the first conference contest of the season. The Knights improved each game but fell 8-25, 10-25, 16-25.

Apparently the girls did not recover mentally by Thursday. They took on class B Warden in a non-league affair at home and came out on the short end, 14-25, 17-25, 16-25. But they were in each game for some time.

“In both match-ups we were not able to make the passes on tough serves from our opponents,” coach Paul Olsufka said. “We need to clean up our mistakes to be more competitive in future matches.”

There were some Royal highlights. McDarra VonStein produced six blocks and two kills against Ki-Be. Taylor Freeman came up with three kills.

The Knights played Warden at home. Again the girls had trouble with getting the ball up to the setter. Warden serves bounced the wrong way on some pass attempts.

“All-around play needs to improve; We need to become more consistent at all areas of the game,” Olsufka said.

Lindsey Small went 10-10 in her serving and put up three blocks. Jacie Phillips was 8-8 serving, with one ace, and the Knights scored six points off of her serving.

“She has a nice hard serve, which makes for bad passes for the other team,” Olsufka said.

Royal’s girls will continue the season tonight with a visit by River View. They will travel to Connell Thursday and Warden Saturday.