After a season that found Oregon (14-7, 5-5 Pac-12) smack dab in the middle of the conference, the Ducks sit at the sixth seed entering the Pac-12 tournament on Wednesday at Ojai Valley Tennis Club.

After nearly two months of Pac-12 play, the seeding for the conference tournament accurately reflects Oregon’s regular season. The first four seeds all consist of the powerhouse California schools that gave Oregon trouble in conference play. Cal (No. 1 seed), UCLA (No. 2), Stanford (No. 3) and USC (No. 4) all handed Oregon losses to either open or close conference play for the Ducks in 2022.

Seeded just ahead of Oregon in the fifth spot is an Arizona State team that Oregon upset back in March. ASU is the only higher seed the Ducks defeated in the regular season.

The Ducks did handle the bottom tier teams however.. Washington (No. 7), Utah (No. 9), Washington State (No. 10) and Colorado (No. 11) were all contributors to Oregon’s five regular season conference wins. Arizona is the only lower seed to be the Ducks.

The first opponent for Oregon will be the Colorado Buffaloes (8-13, 1-9 Pac-12) who make the trip out west as the 11th seed, the lowest in the conference. The Buffs struggled against Pac-12 teams posting a record of 1-9, getting shut out three times and getting outscored 48-13 across their 10 conference matches. The Ducks downed Colorado 4-1 in Boulder in early April during their five game winning streak over conference opponents.

A repeat of the previous matchup with the Buffaloes would see Oregon advance to take on Stanford (14-5, 7-2 Pac-12) in the quarterfinals. From there, the Ducks will likely be thrown into the juggernaut of California schools with impressive programs. Colorado will probably be the only team that Oregon faces in the tournament that they’ve had success against.

With the National Tournament looming in May, No. 38 Oregon needs to perform well in the conference tournament and secure a signature win to boost seeding. 

But the path to the National Tournament starts in California. It starts with Colorado. And it starts Wednesday at 3 p.m. PT.