The Oregon and Oregon State women's basketball teams have lost key players over the last few months, for a variety of reasons. Both coaches say the setbacks have brought their teams together.

No. 24 Oregon, which won its second straight Pac-10 championship but lost to UAB in the first round of the NCAA tournament, suffered a much greater loss in September when Pac-10 player of the year Shaquala Williams tore a ligament in her left knee, ending her season.

"I think we're missing that flamboyant presence that she has on the floor," Oregon coach Jody Runge said, "but we still have a great inside-outside game, and experience that will help us weather the storm."

Oregon State's problems came not from injuries but defections. Twins Chassie and Cherrith Wiersma, unhappy with coach Judy Spoelstra's substitution patterns, announced two months after the Beavers' 14-16 season that they were leaving the program. The twins, who averaged a combined 13.2 points per game, transferred to Wyoming.

"It has only affected us positively," said Spoelstra, the Pac-10 coach of the year. "Our team is a lot closer. When something like that bubbles up, you find out through a whole summer of investigating that there are some deep-seated issues there. I don't know that the twins would have been happy here this season."

The Ducks also will be without three other players this season: Six-foot forward Courtney Moore is back home in Reno, Nev., to help take care of her mother, who has pancreatic cancer; 5-7 point guard Karen Piers returned to Nova Scotia to earn a teaching degree; and 5-9 guard Amanda Brown wants to focus on track.

Also, starting shooting guard Lindsey Dion, who averaged 7.4 points and 3.4 rebounds, has missed most of the team's practices with torn cartilage in her right knee.

While the players combined to average just 4.6 points and 2.2 rebounds a game last season, not having them thin out the Ducks' bench. But Runge said the team still has a strong front line, with 6-foot-5 center Jenny Mowe and 6-foot-3 forwards Angelina Wolvert and Cathrine Kraayeveld.

Mowe is in better shape this season and is playing more like a true center, Runge said.

"Jenny's got to figure out how to do two things: catch it and score," Runge said. "She has been trying to do the spectacular things, and she needs to do the simple things first. There's not many people in the conference who can get around her."

Kraayeveld, a freshman from Kirkland, Wash., had seven points and six rebounds in the Ducks' first exhibition game, and can shoot the 3-pointer, Runge said.

Playing point guard will be 5-7 Kourtney Shreve, who played in 23 games last season.

Oregon State brings back one of the best players in the conference in Felicia Ragland. The 5-9 guard averaged 12.9 points and 6.2 rebounds last season, earning All-Pac-10 honors. Spoelstra also has a good point guard in Syesha Thomas. The center position will be shared by two freshmen -- 6-5 Brina Chaney and 6-2 Hollye Holbrook, who played at Oregon City High School.

Stanford is the consensus team to beat in the Pac-10, but Spoelstra says Nos. 2-10 in the conference is wide open.

"We played them very, very close here last year," Spoelstra said of the Cardinal's 58-54 win, "and our defense and rebounding is going to be just as strong as last year."

As optimistic as Runge is about this season, she can't hide her disappointment at losing in the first round of the NCAA tournament, at home no less. The Ducks had made the NCAA Tournament the previous six years under Runge, but hadn't hosted a game since 1994. Two victories would have put Oregon in the West Regional in Portland.

But it all unraveled against UAB, when the Lady Blazers' Shaquetta Rhodes put back a shot with three seconds left in overtime to beat the Ducks 80-79.

"I don't think there's any lingering effects, but it took all of us a long time to get over that," Runge said. "Going up to the (regional) tournament in Portland was awful. You don't get opportunities in life like that very often, and it's just unfortunate."