The Oregon volleyball team’s visits to the warm climate of Arizona have often left the Ducks unsatisfied.
Seeking to change a history of losses down south, Oregon starts its road trip with a visit to Arizona State in Tempe, Ariz. and continues it with a stop in Tucson, Ariz. to meet up with the Arizona Wildcats. The Ducks finally broke through against both programs last season, sweeping the two schools in Eugene.
Finding that same winning formula in Arizona has been much tougher.
The Ducks lost both matches in Arizona last season and school history hasn’t been kind. Oregon last won in Tucson in 1998 under Cathy Nelson and in Tempe in 1996, also under Nelson.
But this is a new program, and an improved team under coach Jim Moore. Oregon moved up three spots in the latest CSTV/AVCA Coaches poll to No. 21 and plays two schools that are improved from a season ago.
Arizona is 10-4 overall, but 0-2 in Pacific-10 Conference play as they come off losses at No. 5 UCLA and No. 4 USC. The Wildcats held a 2-1 game lead on USC, but dropped the final two games and the match. Arizona had a season-best 18 blocks.
The Wildcats’ attack is led by Randy Goodenough, who averages 4.06 kills per game and Dominique Lamb, who has averages of 2.72 kills and 1.78 blocks per game, had a career high 21 kills against USC.
Arizona was recently featured in an article by volleyball player Brooke Buringrud, who detailed the experience of what it’s like to be a member of the Wildcats volleyball team and can be found at www.SIoncampus.com. Moore and the volleyball program were featured in an article on ESPNU.com last week.
“Arizona is playing very very well and they are going to definitely be ready for us,” Moore said.
Arizona State had a tougher time in Southern California and was swept in both matches with the Los Angeles schools. Libero Sydney Donahue leads the Pac-10 with 6.32 digs per game.
Oregon enters the matches off a split of the Washington schools last weekend at McArthur Court. The matches against the unranked Arizona schools are followed by a return to McArthur Court for matches against the Bay Area schools, No. 10 California and No. 2 Stanford.
Gorana Maricic, who had a career high 33 kills against Washington, leads Oregon with 214 kills. Sonja Newcombe, following up a standout freshman season, is second with 160. Freshman Heather Meyers has made an instant impact and is third in kills with 131.
Meyers holds the top spot for Oregon service aces with 21, but also has a team high 34 service errors.
Libero Katie Swoboda tops the Ducks in digs with 221.