Ducks To Host Sold Out Civil War

Oregon's two seniors, Maite Cazorla and Oti Gildon, were recently reflecting on the explosion of popularity the UO women's basketball program has enjoyed the last four years.

When Cazorla and Gildon made their Matthew Knight Arena debut, in November 2015, the Ducks were coming off a 13-17 season, their first year after the hiring of head coach Kelly Graves by athletic director Rob Mullens and senior women's administrator Lisa Peterson. That was a huge jump from the team's four-win season two years before, but still, only 956 fans were on hand for the 2015-16 home opener against Hampton.

Fast forward to this winter, when the Ducks have just three regular-season home games left in the careers of Cazorla and Gildon. Just a few more people than 956 will on hand for the next one, when the No. 3 Oregon women host No. 9 Oregon State on Friday (6 p.m., Pac-12 Network).

"We have a sold-out arena for this weekend," Gildon said. "Which is pretty awesome."

Indeed, a full contingent of 12,364 fans has tickets for Friday's Civil War. It will be just the second sellout for a women's game in arena history – the first was for Oregon's first game at MKA – and the third all-time UO women's home sellout, all Civil War games.

To accommodate everyone, fans Friday are strongly encouraged to park at Autzen Stadium and take a free shuttle to Matthew Knight Arena. Shuttles will begin departing Autzen at 4:30 p.m., and make return trips after the game.

"It's amazing," sophomore Satou Sabally said. "I would have never thought we would sell out in my second year. I'm really looking forward to it."

The Ducks (23-1, 12-0 Pac-12) will put their perfect conference record on the line Friday against the Beavers, who host the second round of the Civil War on Monday in Corvallis. Oregon State is 20-4 overall and 10-2 in the Pac-12, with the chance to pull even with Oregon in the conference race over the long weekend.

No wonder, then, that sellout crowds are expected for both games. Both Gildon and Cazorla said Friday's will be the biggest crowd they've ever experienced; the previous high, Gildon thought, was the 8,978 who watched the Elite Eight game between Oregon and UConn in a 2017 NCAA Tournament game in Bridgeport, Conn.

Sabally is one of the few Ducks to have experienced a crowd numbering in the five figures. She said she played in an international youth tournament game in France attended by more than 13,000 people.

"It's loud; it's so loud," said Sabally, a native of Germany. "We will have to communicate among each other. We won't hear each other as well. But it's fun; it's amazing. The crowd will cheer for us, and we'll just be in the flow. We just have to stay calm."

Nerves might be an issue Friday, Graves acknowledged. But the Ducks wouldn't have it any other way.

"It's a nice problem to have to worry about, isn't it?" Graves said. "I think that's pretty neat."

The visitors Friday present a different sort of challenge in years past. Though the Beavers have always had productive perimeter players, they also produced two WNBA centers over the last three years in Ruth Hamblin and Marie Gulich.

This year's Oregon State team doesn't feature quite as intimidating a post presence as those two Pac-12 legends. But the Beavers have added elite guard Destiny Slocum, a transfer averaging 19.6 points in conference play, and they're shooting 41.7 percent from three-point range – third nationally entering this week, behind Oregon (43.8 percent) and also Wyoming (41.9).

Cazorla figures to draw the defensive matchup on Slocum, but Graves stressed that it will take a team effort to slow her down.

"And," Graves added, "the staple of their program has always been defense and rebounding. And they're very good defensively, and very good on the boards. So that hasn't changed."

One year removed from ending a 14-game losing streak to Oregon State, the Ducks are looking for back-to-back Civil War wins at home. Then, on Monday, they'll try to win in Corvallis for the first time since 2010.

Both games will be played before massive crowds, for a rivalry that has become among the best in the nation.

"That's pretty cool," Graves said. "It's great for the state of Oregon."