The Oregon volleyball team received quite a surprise Thursday at practice in McArthur Court. A medium-sized bat decided to make Mac Court’s rafters its home for the morning, and swirled above practice, surveying what was down below.
Is this an omen?
Oregon State (15-7 overall, 8-5 Pacific-10 Conference) comes to The Pit tonight in hopes of taking match two of this season’s Civil War from the Ducks, with the first serve slated for 7 p.m. And if you ask Oregon head coach Carl Ferreira about the significance of the team’s little flying friend, it’s eerie.
“Black and orange,” he said. “OSU wears Halloween colored uniforms, we just had Halloween and have a bat here. The Beavers are coming.”
Oregon is coming off its first win in two months, when it defeated Portland in the Rose City on Tuesday, and looks to continue its success when the Beavers come to town. But Oregon State will be no pushover, as the Beavers showed when Oregon visited Gill Coliseum earlier this season.
In the match, the Ducks (9-16,
0-13) stayed with the Beavers until game three, only to see their conference rival speed ahead and eventually win the match in four games.
“Probably the best word you can use to describe Oregon State is efficiency,” Ferreira said. “They take care of the ball well and don’t make ball-handling errors. They don’t give you cheap points, and you can’t sit back and think they will award you with lack of concentration errors.”
The Beavers are assured a winning season, but must roll through and win at least two of their five remaining Pac-10 matches to finish above .500 in the conference. Oregon State was considerably raw when the Ducks traveled to Corvallis in October, but have since come on strong, although their record doesn’t show it.
“Oregon is improving like every other team in this conference, so I’m sure we’ll see a much better Oregon team this time around,” Oregon State head coach Nancy Somera said. “But, Oregon will also see a much better Oregon State team this time around, too.”
Of course, it’s Civil War time, but if you ask Ferreira, that doesn’t weigh too heavily on the team’s preparation.
“In actuality, it’s just another game on the schedule,” he said. “It adds an extra element in preparation in that the coach doesn’t need to add the stimulus of concentration or focus.”
After defeating the Pilots on Tuesday, the Ducks have been playing their best all season. They narrowly lost to California last week, and took a game from No. 4 Stanford. Although the team’s true colors have taken this long to show through, Ferreira is encouraged by the team’s play.
The Ducks are not in the position to challenge for the Pac-10 title and don’t have a chance to gain a berth to the NCAA Tournament, but still know that every game and every match still counts.
“At this time of the year, you should be playing your best volleyball,” he said. “There’s a lot of people who will be back to this team in the future, so you make sure you understand the importance of November.”
But to take care of the Beavers, the Ducks may have to play as strong as ever. Even though Oregon State isn’t the best in the conference, it’s Civil War time, and who couldn’t get up for that?