Volleyball

California has proved to be a thorn in the side of the Oregon volleyball team this season.
The Golden Bears — who narrowly defeated the Ducks in five games earlier this year — were up to their old tricks. This time, under an even more dire situation Saturday night at Haas Pavilion, California showed why it is the most improved team in the Pacific-10 Conference this season.
Oregon, despite a 2-0 set lead, lost in five games (28-30, 24-30, 30-23, 30-26, 15-10) to California, and extended its Pac-10 losing streak to 32 one night after losing to No. 6 Stanford in Palo Alto, Calif.
Senior Lindsay Closs led the Ducks (10-15 overall, 0-11 Pac-10) with 22 kills while freshman Dariam Acevedo had 20. Freshman Kelly Russell also pitched in with 15 kills as the Ducks hit for a .239 percentage — Oregon’s highest this season in a Pac-10 match.
Despite jumping out to a commanding early lead, the Ducks allowed California (15-6, 5-6) to jump back into the contest.
The Golden Bears, who were without star offensive sophomore Mia Jerkov because of an ankle injury she suffered against Oregon State on Friday night, received 22 kills each by senior Leah Young and freshman Jenna Brown.
“The bottom line is that we put ourselves in a position to win and didn’t put them away,” Oregon head coach Carl Ferreira said. “We kind of got away from our system and what we were doing in the first two games and that allowed them to start gaining confidence.”
Overall, the Ducks out-killed California, 80-75, and had seven service aces to the Golden Bears’ three. In the long run, it was Oregon’s offense — which hit for a .348 percentage in game 1 and .375 in game 2 — that could not continue its dominance. The Ducks hit .188 in game 4 and negative .034 in the final stanza, helping propel California to the victory.
Junior Lindsay Murphy also had 15 digs to lead the Ducks in the loss.
Against the Cardinal (19-3, 9-2), Acevedo had 10 kills and Russell had eight, but the Ducks were swept (30-21, 31-29, 30-21) Friday at Maples Pavilion.
Closs also had eight kills, but Stanford was too much to handle, as sophomore Ogonna Nnamani led the Cardinal with 17 kills.
Oregon had a 29-28 lead late in game 2, but couldn’t pull off the victory after a Stanford block on a Ducks’ service error. Stanford junior Sara McGee gave the Cardinal the victory after two straight kills.
“They were really focusing on Dariam on the outside and Lindsay Closs and Kelly Russell did a really good job for us in the middle,” Ferreira said. “We handled and served the ball very well and were in this match, which is something I don’t think we did last time we played them.”
The Cardinal out-killed Oregon, 49-40, but the Ducks held the advantage in digs, 47-44. Both teams had four service aces on the night, with the Ducks led by Closs’ two.
Oregon will visit Oregon State on Friday in the second installment of this season’s Civil War.