The Oregon women’s basketball team is dealing with a two-game losing streak for the second time this season, and each defeat weakens the team’s reputation and confidence in Pacific-10 Conference play.
In five road games this season, the Ducks (9-4 overall, 2-2 Pac-10) won their first two but are now 2-3. They committed 20 turnovers in each game of the Los Angeles road trip.
Oregon will attempt to get back on track and reclaim a .500 traveling record against Oregon State at Gill Coliseum Saturday at 2 p.m.
The Civil War history favors the Ducks, who are 20-14 all-time against the Beavers when playing in Corvallis and 50-22 overall. Oregon State (4-9, 0-4) has taken the last two meetings from Oregon on its home court.
“This is probably their best chance to get a (Pac-10) win,” Oregon senior Cathrine Kraayeveld said. “It’s the Civil War — they’re going to be pumped up for the game and we have to be just as ready for it.”
Oregon’s Andrea Bills is two points away from 1,000 for her career. She is averaging 10.8 points per game and has scored 141 this season, but was limited to four points against UCLA. The 6-foot-3 center will be expected to be more productive in the paint against an Oregon State team that has no player taller than 6 feet
2 inches.
Freshman Kristen Forristall has started all four conference games for the Ducks at forward in place of sophomore Eleanor Haring.
In that stretch, Forristall is averaging 21 minutes and 6.3 points per game.
The Beavers have started Pac-10 play with a four-game losing skid to the quartet of California schools. In that span, they have been outscored 214-295.
Senior guard Shannon Howell, who leads the team and is third in the conference in scoring with 17.8 points per game, has shot 18.9 percent from the field (10 of 53) and averaged 7.3 points over the past four games.
Howell was the nation’s leading scorer through the first nine games of the season with 22.4 points per game.
Oregon will have to be vigilant on the defensive end with juniors Mandy Close and Kim Butler on the floor. Both players average a little over 10 points per game.
“They are smaller and quicker,” Oregon head coach Bev Smith said, when comparing her team to Oregon State. “We’ve played a lot of teams like that this year, so I think we’re ready to play that mentally and physically.”
Close, a guard, suffered a concussion against UCLA and did not play against USC. With that absence, her streak of 74-consecutive appearances ended but she has been cleared to play Saturday.
Butler bounced back to her position at forward with 19 points against the Women of Troy after sustaining a minor ankle sprain last week. Redshirt sophomore guard Casey Bunn is the team’s leading rebounder, pulling down 5.6 per game.
Oregon State’s most notable inconsistency has been that no player has started all 13 games this season.

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