With flowers in her hands, and her mother at her side, the moment finally hit Zakia Houston: This was the final time she’d be competing at Matthew Knight Arena.
“It was really emotional,” Houston said with a smile. “It was like a reality check. It didn’t hit me till then. I just treated this meet like any other meet. When they had us walking down I was like, ‘Oh my God, this is crazy’. So, I started crying and my mom started crying — it was crazy.”
Houston, along with fellow seniors Erin Block, Natasha Katzaroff, McKenzie Wilcox and Kelsey Leslie, were celebrated in their final home meet. Looking for their fourth straight national championship, the aforementioned group of seniors have displayed tremendous success in their tenure at Oregon with only a single loss to Maryland their freshmen season.
“I’ve always looked up to them from day one,” junior Nicole Erlichman said. “They’re our big sisters and we respect them and love them more than anything. It felt really good to send them off well.”
Oregon dominated against visiting Alderson-Broaddus and Hawaii Pacific in its final home meet, recording its highest score of the season (286.100).
In the week leading up to her final home meet, Houston had no clue what to expect, emotionally, from the unfamiliar experience of saying goodbye. It was hard for her to believe that four years at Oregon had gone by so fast. That same feeling was shared by her mother Cynthia following the meet.
“The four years went by really, really quickly,” Cynthia said. “I couldn’t believe it’s been four. It’s kind of surreal. It seemed like it was yesterday she was just coming onto this campus, and now she’ll be leaving.”
Though it was the team’s final meet from the friendly confines of Matthew Knight Arena, the season is still far from over. Oregon’s next four meets are all on the road, with the quest for a fourth straight national championship still in focus.
“I think it’s so weird this year because all our home meets are so quick, and we still have half our season left,” Block said earlier this week. “We won’t think about (our last meet) till we’re done with nationals.”
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