2011 Volleyball Team Returns Five Starters
Seeking its fifth postseason trip under head coach Jim Moore and ninth in school history, the Ducks graduated only one senior from last year’s team and return five starters from last year’s 19-11 team that ranked as high as 11th nationally. The team also adds one of its top newcomer classes — a six-person unit — that features a prep All-American, another Prep volleyball Senior Ace, and a junior college All-American.
Redshirt junior outside hitter Alaina Bergsma and sophomore setter Lauren Plum were All-Pac-10 Honorable Mention and All-Pac-10 Freshman Team picks, respectively, last season.
Bergsma successfully returned from hip surgery to rank third on the squad in hitting (.270) and kills (3.14 per set) last fall, and posted double-digit kill totals in 18 matches. She racked up four of the team’s top nine kill totals, including +20-kill efforts vs. Washington (21) and Arizona (20). The former mark helped her earn National Player of the Week honors – UO’s fourth pick in as many years.
Plum led frosh setters nationally last year and ranked 12th overall in assists (11.75 p/s), while the Ducks hit .256 team-wise and ranked 30th nationally in hitting with its fourth-best season mark ever. The Poway, Calif., native twice logged +65-assist totals among her eight +50 marks, and logged seven double-doubles – tops among returning Pac-12 setters this year.
Both got a head start on the fall schedule after playing with the A2 National Team this summer, and Plum was tabbed the starting setter for the U.S. Junior Team in July's FIVB World Championships. She started six of the event's eight matches and helped the team tie its best-ever finish (fourth).
The squad sports four other returning starters from 2010 – the junior trio of outside hitter Katherine Fischer, libero Haley Jacob and defensive specialist Kellie Kawasaki, and sophomore middle blocker Ariana Williams.
Jacob started every match last year and ended with UO’s fifth-and sixth-best all-time dig totals and averages (450 / 4.13 p/s). Kawasaki was tapped for 15 starts in 2010 as a defensive specialist, and in 2009 saw the most action among the team’s three-libero rotation and averaged 3.00 digs (p/s) in her 89 sets of action.
Other Duck returnees include junior and sophomore outside hitters Lauren Gross and Jaklyn Wheeler. Gross is the team’s lone left-handed hitter and saw career highs last year in nearly every category, and Wheeler is one of the team’s most versatile players and was a prep Under Armour All-American honorable mention.
The Ducks’ six-member newcomer class includes a junior college All-America transfer (middle blocker Milica Krstojevic) and five talented freshmen. Freshman outside hitter Liz Brenner was a 2010 prep All-American and freshman outside hitter Chloe Buckendahl joined her on the PrepVolleyball Senior Ace list.
The other three newcomers — middle blocker Savannah Paffen, setter Shellsy Ashen and defensive specialist Natalie Bookout Gonzalez — offer impressive club credentials after helping their teams to top-seven Junior Olympic Tournament finishes.