'Playing our best ball': Oregon volleyball gearing up to make a run in NCAA Tournament
Despite possibly having to compete against the Oregon football team’s Pac-12 championship game showdown with Washington on Friday, volleyball coach Matt Ulmer is expecting a healthy and hearty crowd for the opening rounds Thursday and Friday of the NCAA Tournament for the Ducks at Matthew Knight Arena.
Announced as a No. 2 seed, the Ducks (26-5, 16-4 Pac-12) will host the first two rounds of the tournament, with a matchup against Southeastern Louisiana Thursday. If Oregon gets past the Lions, they’ll play the winner of No. 7 Iowa State and Hawaii.
“A rowdy one,” Ulmer said of what he expects from the crowd. “Let’s have a party, let’s have fun. Last year our playoff atmosphere was great, a lot of students and everybody there was living their best life and we were getting after it together, it really felt that way.”
The Ducks, who scheduled a strong nonconference schedule to better prepare them for an NCAA Tournament run, are looking to improve upon an Elite Eight finish a year ago.
What to know about Southeastern Louisiana
The first team in the way, SE Louisiana, is 28-4 and dropped just nine sets in the Southland Conference en route to a tournament championship sweep of Texas A&M at Corpus Christi. Two of the Lions’ losses came against common foes in a four-set loss to both Cal and Washington — both team’s Oregon defeated twice.
The Ducks are not underestimating the undersized Lions, though.
“They do everything well,” Ulmer said. “They’re not as physical as some of the teams we play, just size-wise, but very smart, great ball control, really impressive serving team. We definitely have our hands full. Really nice setter and they set everywhere. They do some things a bit different than what we’re used to as far as tempo goes with middles, but we’re playing our best ball. I think we’re ready for the challenge.”
If Oregon wins it’ll either rematch with the Rainbow Wahine (23-8, 14-4 Big West), who it defeated in three sets in August, or against the No. 7 Cyclones (20-9, 11-7 Big 12).
How Oregon is preparing for Thursday's match vs. the Lions
For the Ducks, the focus will be on themselves before the first match begins at 7 p.m. Thursday in Eugene.
“There’s always things we want to tinker with just to get more confidence in,” Ulmer said. “I thought halfway through the year I thought our connection with our middles on offense was getting really strong, and I felt like we got away from that the last few weeks. We’re trying to get Mimi (Colyer) going a bit better and she had a nice response and had a great match against Oregon State and I know she’s feeling a lot more confident. So just trying to get our middle connection back more.”
Iowa State and Hawaii will play first at Matthew Knight Arena at 4 p.m. Thursday before the Ducks face off with the Lions. The winners of those games will play at 7 p.m. Friday with a Sweet 16 berth on the line. All first and second round matches will be streamed on ESPN+.
Program-record 5 Ducks named to All-Pac-12 volleyball team
Following the regular season, the Pac-12 announced its all-conference teams, and the Ducks produced a program record five All-Pac-12 picks, with the other two starters earning honorable mention honors.
Colyer, Gabby Gonzales, Morgan Lewis, Kara McGhee and Hannah Pukis were named all-conference, and Karson Bacon and Georgia Murphy were named honorable mention, as decided by Pac-12 coaches.
“We got all seven of our starters to all-conference,” Ulmer said. “And it’s a loaded conference, maybe this year more than in recent years. It’s a really great honor for our team and shows the depth that our team has. A big reason why we’re successful is because we have so many different weapons. That the conference coaches saw that is great and I know the room felt good when all seven got named.”
The previous program record was three all-conference selections, tied by the 2008, 2012 and 2022 teams.
Alec Dietz covers University of Oregon football, volleyball, women’s basketball and baseball for The Register-Guard. You may reach him at adietz@registerguard.com and you can follow him on Twitter @AlecDietz.
This article originally appeared on Register-Guard: Oregon Ducks volleyball ready to make NCAA Tournament run
