Ducks facing schedule conflict.

Byline: UO WOMEN'S BASKETBALL NOTEBOOK By Bob Rodman The Register-Guard

The Civil War women's basketball games between Oregon and Oregon State have been played, each winning a home-floor battle.

But the fight apparently goes on.

Attempting to avoid playing two rival games in the same week next season, the Ducks are scheduled to play host to the Beavers on Dec. 30. The return match is scheduled for Jan. 27 at Oregon State.

All well and good, it seems, except for one major hurdle.

The Beavers have scheduled themselves into a Dec. 28-30 tournament at San Diego and do not appear inclined to change that portion of their schedule.

Oregon officials on Tuesday said that the negotiations with Oregon State are continuing.

Much of the scheduling difficulty can be related directly to the crunch caused by the Pac-10 tournament being staged the first week of March, forcing the majority - if not all - of teams' nonconference games to have to be played in November and into mid-December.

The Ducks began this season's conference schedule on Dec. 20 and will begin next season's Pac-10 play on Dec. 21.

Shooter

Taylor Lilley, signed to a national letter of intent by the Ducks last November, has been nominated to play in the McDonald's All-American high school game on March 29 at San Diego.

Lilley is a 5-foot-6 senior guard from Hart High School in Newhall, Calif., the same high school attended by former Oregon star Sara Wilson (1991-94).

Averaging nearly 19 points this season, Lilley reset the school record she held for single-season three-pointers. Lilley had recorded 78 of the long-range shots as of last week. She set the Hart single-game record for three-pointers with nine on Jan. 20.

Lilley was a former prep teammate of Ashlee Trebilcock, now a freshman who recently transferred from UCLA to Ohio State.

Awarded

UO head coach Bev Smith is scheduled to be presented the Becky Sisley Award prior to the start of the Oregon-ASU game at McArthur Court at 12:30 p.m. Sunday.

Named after the university's first director of women's intercollegiate athletics, the honor is given annually (since 2000) to a former UO female athlete for community involvement, career development and support of university ideals.

Starters stopped

Oregon's bench outscored California's reserves 26-17 in last weekend's 49-39 loss to the Bears at Berkeley, Calif.

But the Duck substitutes also outscored the UO starters, doubling the first five 26-13.

Two of Oregon's starters - point guard Kaela Chapdelaine and forward Kedzie Gunderson - failed to score in a combined 39 minutes of playing time.

RPI update

The Ducks move into this week's games against Arizona and Arizona State with an RPI ranking of 100, trailing all but three Pac-10 teams in the listing of 332 NCAA Division I teams supplied by Collegiate Basketball News.

Pac-10 teams rated ahead of Oregon include ASU (11th), Stanford (15th), UCLA (41st), Washington (49th), USC (51st) and California (63rd).

Oregon State is No. 104, Arizona 159 and WSU 181.