A roller coaster of emotions climbed and descended as Oregon fell to No. 14 California in its final home match of the 2004 season Friday at McArthur Court.
Seniors Katie O’Neil and Lauren Westendorf were both recognized in a pregame celebration and then announced in the starting lineup to honor their final contest on the Ducks’ floor.
In unscripted fashion, however, the Bears claimed their 12th-straight match over Oregon with a 3-0 win, 30-23, 30-24, 30-14.
“It was great to see the two of them (O’Neil and Westendorf) on the floor again,” Oregon head coach Carl Ferreira said despite suffering the loss. “They came in together, they room together, they are both very special, and I thought it was a very special night for them.”
Westendorf, who continues to recover from an anterior cruciate ligament injury sustained on Sept. 24, successfully served the first ball of the match and then substituted out after a sideout by Cal.
“I had been planning on serving for about a week,” Westendorf said. “I actually just got clearance from my doctor to be out of my brace and serve. It was nice to be on the court and nice to serve and have that symbolic moment to end my career.”
The Bakersfield, Calif., native who broke the Pacific-10 Conference record for service aces in a match with 12 against Seton Hall on Sept. 18, said that her name would not be found in any future box scores.
“I am done — I had clearance for one match and so I’m done,” she said. “My career as an Oregon volleyball player is over.”
As heartbreaking as that was to hear, coach Ferreira remained stuck on the first play of the match.
“I thought it was great that Lauren served and got her serve in,” Ferreira said. “I was most concerned about Lauren being too energetic and wanting to dig the ball, forgetting that she has a bum wheel.”
The woes began shortly after that symbolic moment for the Ducks, who finished with eight service errors and no aces.
Cal (14-9 overall, 9-5 Pac-10) used a 12-0 scoring streak to go up 17-9 in the first game and constrict Oregon’s intensity level.
“I thought we played the way we wanted to play,” Ferreira said. “We just got stuck in that one rotation. Other than that, we were getting points when we needed to get points.”
Oregon (9-16, 1-14) glanced at a 5-0 lead in the second game and managed to stay either ahead or tied with the Bears until an attack error directed Cal to the winning path.
The Bears found their comfort zone at the net in the third game, as they recorded six block assists. Cal held Oregon to nine kills to accompany nine errors (.000 hitting percentage) after the Ducks averaged .326 through the first two games.
“We had a few stumbling blocks for a while,” Cal head coach Rich Feller said. “We got some pretty good defense and ran our offense the way we wanted to.
Junior outside hitter Kelly Russell finished with a match-high 17 kills for Oregon. Sophomores Sarah Mason and Kristen Bitter added 12 and nine kills, respectively.
O’Neil finished with 16 digs, moving her career total to 955 with four matches left this season.
“I’m really just trying to soak up each moment with my teammates,” O’Neil said. “Tonight I took an extra moment to look around and just feel the feeling because you remember the feelings — not the scores and not the outcomes.”

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