No. 3 Oregon volleyball defeated the Utah Utes in straight sets on Sunday morning 3-0, moving its winning streak to 6 games and go undefeated on their four-game road trip.
The Ducks jumped out to an early lead against the Utes, taking a 9-3 lead in the beginning of the set thanks to the dominating play of redshirt senior outside hitter Alaina Bergsma.
Seeing her team down by 6 points early, Utah head coach Beth Launiere called an early timeout in an attempt to quell the offensive surge from the Ducks.
However, after the timeout Oregon continued rolling and a 6-0 run put them up 16-6 over the Utes and forced Launiere to call her second timeout of the set.
The Utes had no answer for Oregon in the first set and the Ducks took the first set 25-18 on a kill from freshman middle blocker Canace Finley.
Oregon continued their dominant play in the second set and jumped on Utah early on 8-3.
The offensive barrage continued and when Beth Launiere saw her team down 15-7 she called timeout to stop the bleeding.
Turning point. In the end though Utah had no answer for Alaina Bergsma and company, and the Ducks coasted to a second set victory 25-16 on a kill at the net by Martenne Bettendorf putting them up comfortably 2-0.
Set three brought more of the same for the Ducks and in the early stages Oregon took a 9-6 lead over the Utes.
The Ducks went on a brief offensive spurt and after taking a 12-7 lead, Utah called yet another timeout to try to ensure the set did not get out of hand.
As the set wore on the Utes were able to hang around and pulled within one at 17-16 and eventually tied it at 21 forcing Jim Moore to call his first timeout of the match.
The end of the third was the most tightly contested part of the match but the Ducks persevered, and a combined block from Ariana Williams and Lauren Plum netted Oregon a 25-23 third set victory and 3-0 win in straight sets.
On the horizon. The Ducks now return home to the confines of Matthew Knight Arena to take on the Bay Area schools next weekend. They will square off against no. 17 California on Friday night at 6 pm and than take on no. 6 Stanford on Sunday afternoon at 1 pm, both matches will be televised on the Pac-12 Network.