It has become an all-too-familiar scenario for the Oregon soccer team: It takes on a top-25 team on the road, plays tough, but loses because of an inability to score.
That formula described Friday’s match, but on Sunday, the Ducks simply got blown out of the water.
Oregon lost 3-0 to No. 13 Southern California Friday, with all three goals coming in a 13-minute stretch in the second half. Then the Ducks faced No. 7 UCLA Sunday, and the Bruins showed no mercy, scoring eight goals on 35 shots and embarrassing the Ducks 8-0 at Drake Stadium in Los Angeles.
The losses dropped Oregon from fourth to seventh in the Pacific-10 Conference standings. The Ducks are now 1-3-0 in the Pac-10 and 4-11-0 overall.
Friday’s match with the Trojans was almost what Oregon had expected from the road trip.
“We played at a very high level in the first half, but we couldn’t convert any of our chances,” Ducks head coach Bill Steffen said. “We kind of kept them in it.”
Oregon played with USC in that first half, taking five shots to the Trojans’ eight. But in the second half, the Ducks’ defense faltered, and USC rattled off nine shots while Oregon could muster only one.
“In the second half, we tended to play to their style, which was to their benefit,” said Steffen. “After they scored the first goal, we lost our composure.”
In Sunday’s match, style and composure were thrown out the window, as UCLA dominated Oregon in every facet of the game.
The Ducks had 12 shots in the game, but only four of those were on goal. Oregon let UCLA have 35 shots, and 22 of those were on goal. The Ducks gave up 10 corner-kicks and took only two, and even had one more foul than the Bruins.
Not surprisingly, UCLA broke a few records in the process of obliterating Oregon Sunday. The Bruins’ eight goals were the most against a Division I opponent in school history, and their 35 shots were also a school record. UCLA scored 11 goals on 49 shots in a match in 1993, but those marks came against Southern California College, a National Association of Intercollegiate Athletics school.
The loss was the worst in Oregon’s four-year history. The Ducks have given up six goals on three separate occasions this year, and five times in their history, but have never given up seven or eight goals. In 1997, UCLA beat Oregon 6-0 in Eugene, which was the Ducks’ second-worse loss ever, at the time.
Three seasons later, the Bruins dealt Oregon a loss that may stick in the record books longer than the first.
The Ducks will take on Oregon State next Friday at Papé Field. Oregon is 4-0 against the Beavers in four meetings, outscoring Oregon State 12-2 in those games. The game starts at 3 p.m.