Ducks Weekly Volleyball Digest

The Ducks (5-0, 0-0) return home to McArthur Court for a quick weekend set of non-conference matches against Fresno State and San Diego State. Oregon battles the Bulldogs on Friday at 7:00 PM, followed by a tilt against SDSU on Saturday at 7:00 PM.

Photo courtesy: goducks.com

EUGENE - THE WEEK THAT WAS: Oregon went unbeaten during its first road trip of 2006, defeating Long Beach State (ranked No. 17 by CVU.com) on Aug. 30 before winning the Freemont Investment & Loan Invitational hosted by Cal State Northridge with victories over the host Matadors and Utah State.

ABOUT THE DUCKS: The Oregon volleyball team welcomes seven newcomers and returns six players from last season’s squad, which finished 12-18 overall, 1-17 in the Pac-10 Conference. Among the returnees are SO OH Mira Djuric, a Pac-10 All-Freshman team member in 2005, and SO L Katie Swoboda, who earned honorable mention Pac-10 All-Freshman status.

HEAD COACH JIM MOORE: Oregon head coach Jim Moore is in his second season in Eugene and 18th overall as a collegiate head coach. In his inaugural campaign at UO, Moore led the Ducks to their highest win total (12) and winning percentage (.400) in 14 seasons. Moore has compiled an overall mark of 369-174 (.680) during a career that has also included stops at Northern Michigan, Kansas State, Texas and Chico State. His 1993 Northern Michigan team won the NCAA II National Championship.

SCOUTING FRESNO STATE: The Bulldogs (1-6) are off to a rough start in 2006, having dropped four straight without winning a game. Fresno State’s lone victory came at home in straight sets vs. Pacific on Aug. 26, but the Bulldogs are playing a difficult non-conference schedule that has already included four opponents ranked in the top 25. JR OH Alisha McKee leads the team with 3.38 kills per game and is the only player on the squad to start all seven matches this season. Ruben Nieves is in his second season as the Bulldogs’ head coach and has an overall record of 8-27 (.229). Fresno State, a WAC member, leads the all-time series with UO, 9-8, but the Ducks have won the past two (2005) and five of the last seven meetings.

SCOUTING SAN DIEGO STATE: The Aztecs (4-3) have rallied from a 1-3 start and won the Big Orange Invitational hosted by Syracuse with three straight wins away from home last weekend. SDSU and Oregon have one common opponent in 2006 in Cal State Northridge, a team that beat the Aztecs in four games and fell to the Ducks in four. SR OH Melanie Greene averages 3.58 kills and 2.19 digs per game, and JR L Aime Cordeiro digs 5.88 balls per contest. Head coach Mark Warner is in his 12th season at SDSU and has an overall mark of 181-164 (.525). His 1995 squad won the WAC championship and advanced to the NCAA Sweet 16. The Aztecs, now a member of the Mountain West Conference, have won six of eight all-time matches against Oregon, but the two sides have not played since 1988.

BIG WIN: If hard evidence was needed to prove that Oregon’s volleyball program is headed in a different direction under second-year head coach Jim Moore, the Ducks surely produced it with their 3-1 upset at Long Beach State on Aug. 30. The 49ers, ranked No. 17 in the CVU.com preseason top 25, have a storied volleyball tradition, which includes three NCAA Championships. Only Stanford, which has six titles, has more hardware than The Beach. Since LBSU was not ranked in the AVCA top 25 - considered the primary poll in women’s volleyball - the Ducks will wait a little bit longer before trumpeting a win over a ranked opponent for the first time since 1998. But that milestone looks a lot more realistic today than at any point in recent memory.

WHAT A DIFFERENCE A YEAR MAKES: Last season, after their first five Division ! matches, the Ducks were 4-1. Not too shabby and similar to this year’s 5-0 start. But a closer look behind the numbers tells a different story. At this time last year, UO’s opponents were hitting .146. This year, it’s .094. Through five in ‘05, the Ducks dug 12.1 balls per game. In ‘06 that number increases to 14.4. Service errors - 1.9 per game last year - currently sit at 1.2. And so on, and so on. Individually, SR MB Kristen Bitter was hitting .096 with two dozen kills in the early going, compared to .341 with 38 balls on the floor this time around. SO OH Mira Djuric was impressive at the start of her freshman season in ‘05, but her attack percentage has soared from .239 then to .346 now.

SERVING IT UP: Only five matches into the 2006 season, the Ducks have already produced two of the top serving performances in team history. SR OH Erin Little had six on Aug. 27 vs. Portland State, which ranks her tied for fifth on the single-match record list, and SO OH Mira Djuric trumped her with seven vs. Utah State on Sept. 2 to tie for the third most. Only nine other players in school history have recorded six or more aces in a single match. The record is 12 by Lauren Westendorf against Seton Hall in 2004.

LEADERS OF THE PAC: The Ducks lead the Pac-10 in service aces, averaging 2.16 per game. Oregon is second in blocks (3.50) per game and third in opponent hitting percentage (.094). SO OH Mira Djuric leads the conference in aces per game (0.84) and ranks seventh in points per game (5.00). SR MB Kristen Bitter is fifth in blocks (1.32/gm). SR OH Erin Little is sixth in hitting percentage (.391), fourth in aces (0.47/gm) and 10th in blocks (1.16/gm). SO L Katie Swoboda is fifth in digs with 4.79 per game.

FINAL FOUR: Oregon (5-0) is one of four unbeaten teams in the Pac-10 along with UCLA (6-0), California (6-0) and USC (6-0). Every Pac-10 side has a winning percentage of .750 or better with the exception of 1-6 Oregon State (.143).

HELLO, GOODBYE: The Ducks may get JR MB Karen Waddington back from a toe sprain in time for this weekend’s matches, but likely lose FR MB Neticia Enesi to an ankle sprain suffered during practice on Sept. 4. Waddington has been out since the start of preseason camp, while Enesi has appeared in all 19 games over the team’s first five matches.

FASTEST TO 500: With 14 kills in the win over Cal State Northridge on Sept. 1, SO OH Mira Djuric reached the 500-kill plateau faster than any Oregon player since the start of full record keeping in 1982. She now has 516.

STILL DIGGING IT: SO L Katie Swoboda has been the team-leader in digs in all five matches this season. She has posted a match-high in the category in three straight.

BITTER BREAKS INTO TOP 10: SR MB Kristen Bitter has broke into Oregon’s top 10 list for career blocks and now ranks eighth with 297. She is 22 behind Angee Henderson (1991-94) for seventh.

MOORE OF THE SAME: Head coach Jim Moore improved his non-conference record at Oregon to 16-1 with two wins last week. That translates into a .941 winning percentage, easily the highest of any coach in Oregon’s 39-year history.

FAB FROSH: When FR MB Sonja Newcombe signed to play for the Ducks last fall, she became just the sixth Volleyball Magazine Fab 50 player to make Eugene her college home. Newcombe is UO’s first Fab 50 recruit since current teammate SR S Heather Madison (2003).

NO GO(rana): JR OH Gorana Maricic, a Serbian transfer from Northwood University, will redshirt in 2006. Maricic, a NCAA II All-American last season, was not granted a one-time release by her former school and will be eligible to play for the Ducks in 2007.

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