Karen Waddington remains the last tie to another era.
The senior middle blocker, whose style, based more on consistency than flash, came to Eugene from Langley, British Columbia in 2003, recruited by then-Oregon coach Carl Ferreira.
Four years have passed, close teammates have graduated and yet Waddington remains.
On Friday, Waddington makes her final regular season appearance before McArthur Court faithful with in-state rival Oregon State in town.
“It’s going to be big,” she said. “I’m excited.”
While the names on the roster has changed and coach Jim Moore has replaced Ferreira, Waddington is a mainstay who has been able to share her perspective with underclassmen who had never experienced consistent losing.
“That’s one thing that Jim wants to make sure that Katie (Swoboda) and I to portray to the younger players is that we have come from nothing basically into what it was last weekend,” Waddington said. “It’s a complete turnaround. My perspective is important to them and I hope they understand that where we came from has nothing to do with what we are now.”
In Waddington’s freshman year, Oregon was 10-19 and 1-17 in the Pacific-10 Conference. Her sophomore year – Moore’s first – ended with a familiar 12-18 overall mark and 1-17 finish in conference play. Last season, Oregon made a noticeable improvement and ended the season 17-12 overall and 7-11 in the Pac-10.
Waddington was close to last season’s senior core of Kristen Bitter, Erin Little and Heather Madison. They shared in team highlights last season, and even now, off in the real world, they continue to share when Oregon has more breakthroughs this season – sweeping the Arizona road trip and upsetting top-10 teams.
“We do share them with each other,” Waddington said. “They may not be there, but they are always e-mailing us. Kristen is over in Spain watching us. Every couple of weeks I’ll get an e-mail from her.”
Much the way the volleyball team struggled in a recent stretch of seven losses in nine matches, Moore says he noticed Waddington pressing and her blocking suffered. Moore said two consecutive upsets of then No. 6 USC and No. 9 UCLA did just as much for Waddington, as it did for the team.
“Blocking is without question the most difficult thing,” Moore said. “She had a great year last year blocking and she’s struggled a little bit this year, but it’s now coming back and I’m really happy.”
Waddington sits in the middle of the team’s statistics. She has 98 kills, good for sixth on the team. On defense, she has seven solo blocks (fourth) and 67 block assists (third).
Quiet by nature, Waddington prefers a lead-by-example approach.
“She is a big sister to us and it’s really nice to have someone who has a lot of experience and can share it with us,” freshman Heather Meyers said.
In the beginning of the season, Meyers was finding her way. Waddington provided a soothing presence.
“I was nervous,” Meyers said. “She is one of those people who can calm me down and one of those people you can ask for help. She is a good example.”
Waddington too remembers when she questioned whether she’d play college volleyball or remain close to home in Langley.
“For most of high school, I thought that I would probably stay in Canada and play either with teams in B.C. or Alberta – closer to home – and not until my junior year that I started thinking about it,” she said.
The transition to college volleyball was difficult, much like it is for any freshman, and Waddington thinks back to going up against USC’s 6-foot-6 middle blocker Emily Adams.
“That’s what I remember from my freshman year,” Waddington said.
After Ferreira left following her first year in Eugene, Waddington joined her teammates at the time for a meeting with Moore. He shared his expectations and who would make up his coaching staff.
“He changed the team’s mentality completely,” Waddington said. “It’s gone from fitting into playing in the Pac-10 and expecting one or two wins to expecting to be top-three in the Pac-10,” Waddington said. “Our goals are set higher. We’re more committed to the team aspect of it. We’re more competitive.”
Oregon is 18-9 overall and 7-8 in the Pac-10, good for the No. 14 ranking in the nation. Wins against powerhouses USC and UCLA show Oregon has the talent – it’s the approach that continues to evolve.
“We still need to go into games knowing that we can win and not have the big names like USC scare us,” Waddington said. “That is one of the things that we talked about is that we need respect from everyone else, but first we have to respect ourselves.”
The wins against the Los Angeles schools bolster Oregon’s NCAA Tournament résumé and has the senior confident the Ducks will be earning another berth this fall and the chance to surpass the team’s first-round exit to Hawaii last season.
“I would love it,” Waddington said. “We need more than just an appearance. We need to go deeper this time.”
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