For the second time this season, the Oregon women’s volleyball team hopes to beat its in-state rivals in today’s Civil War match in Corvallis at 7 p.m.
The Ducks (15-4 overall, 5-4 Pac-10) last beat the Beavers (3-15, 0-9) 3-1 on Sept. 29 at McArthur Court, ending their six-game losing streak in the series.
For the seniors, it was their first Civil War victory at Oregon. But for senior setter Heather Madison, the rivalry isn’t something that concerns her, even if Oregon State had previously beaten the Ducks every time in her career.
“The rivalry’s fun and everything but I don’t take it to an extreme,” Madison said. “I mean, you don’t want to lose to the Beavers, but it’s not life and death and our whole season doesn’t come down to this one moment.”
Madison said the team doesn’t need to focus on the match for bragging rights; rather, it’s another match the Ducks need to win to get to the NCAA tournament.
“You can’t put more emphasis on that one match than any other match,” Madison said.
That change in ideology results from the Ducks’ solid performances so far in the conference, which has put the cross-hairs on the team’s back, Madison said.
“We do have something to lose now and teams aren’t rooting for us because we’re not the underdogs anymore,” Madison.
For senior outside hitter Erin Little, the last Civil War game proved to be one of her defining moments of the season as she tallied 10 kills and 15 digs during the match. Like Madison, she believes the Oregon State match is just another stepping stone towards the season’s end result, and not a hyped rivalry game.
“It’s more about our end goal,” Little said. “This is just one step along the way rather than being ‘The Big One.’”
Freshman middle blocker Sonja Newcombe led the previous match against Oregon State with 19 kills and 22 points, and, after winning Pac-10 Player of the Week for her performance against the Arizona schools, has become one of Oregon’s premier hitters.
Although Newcombe didn’t perform as well against the Bay-area teams statistically, coach Jim Moore said that the entire team’s performance resulted in terrible statistics for everyone.
“We hit negative as a team against Stanford,” Moore said. “Everybody played poorly.”
Moore doesn’t believe that Cal and Stanford keyed on Newcombe because of her recent accolades. He said that she performed well enough, considering the opponents.
Even with the monumental win against Cal, Moore doesn’t believe the team needs to worry about over-confidence in its upcoming matches.
“This is a team that’s won five Pac-10 matches in the past six years,” Moore said. “Our biggest thing is to focus on getting better every day.”
One player that is getting better every day is junior middle blocker Karen Waddington who was limited by a foot injury and has seen an increase in playing time now that she’s close to full strength.
The Civil War match also marks the second half of the Pac-10 schedule, and for Madison, she hasn’t become fully aware that her career is nearly over.
“It hasn’t really hit me yet that it’s the last part of the season, but it’s been exciting,” Madison said.
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