The Stanford women’s tennis team has one more ‘tune-up’ match before facing their first truly formidable opponent at home this weekend. On Saturday, the No. 10 Cardinal will take on No. 46 Harvard at the Taube Family Tennis Stadium, hoping to eliminate any kinks in their form before returning the next day to battle No. 11 Vanderbilt.
Stanford currently stands at 4-0 after successively vanquishing, with relative ease, No. 54 Princeton, No. 44 Saint Mary’s, No. 19 Notre Dame and No. 31 Ohio State. Over the course of the season’s first two weeks, the team has accumulated a total match record of 25-7, and its top three singles players – sophomores Carol Zhao, Taylor Davidson and Caroline Doyle – each have won all four of their individual matches. The team of Doyle and senior Ellen Tsay has also won all three of its doubles matches.
In somewhat of a head-scratching move, the NCAA has decided to reward this dominance by dropping the Cardinal in the rankings from No. 8 to No. 10. It is their rank at the end of the season that truly matters, however, with the Cardinal hoping to make further strides towards their ultimate goal this weekend.
First on the agenda is Harvard, who can take some solace from the fact that their rival Princeton, who recently booted them from the top spot on U.S. News and World Report’s college rankings, has fallen behind by 12 spots in tennis (No. 46 vs. No. 58).
Nevertheless, the Crimson are not expected to provide much trouble for the Cardinal. They should definitely not be overlooked, however, as they currently hold a respectable 4-1 record, with consecutive wins over No 45 DePaul, No. 60 Boston College and No. 70 North Texas. Their one loss came against Vanderbilt, who lies in wait to battle the Card on Sunday.
Do not be deceived by the Vanderbilt Commodores’ 4-2 record – they will come to play on Sunday. Their two losses came at a national tournament, attended by many of the best teams in the country, which was held last weekend in Charlottesville, Virginia. They almost escaped with an upset against No. 5 Cal in their first game of that tournament, eventually falling 4-3. The very next day, however, they proved just how dangerous they can be with a huge 4-1 upset against then-No. 4 Duke.
On paper, Stanford definitely holds an advantage. The Cardinal boast two doubles teams ranked in the top-12 (No. 5 Zhao/Davidson and No. 12 Doyle/Tsay), while Vanderbilt’s best pair is No. 18 Courtney Colton and Sydney Campbell. The NCAA declares the Cardinal to be superior on the singles side as well, with three top-16 players (No. 10 Zhao, No. 14 Davidson, and No. 16 Doyle), while Vanderbilt’s best singles player is No. 15 Campbell.
Nevertheless, victories are never won on paper. This will be the first time Stanford and Vanderbilt play each other since the Card routed the Commodores, 4-0 in the 2007 NCAA tournament.
Contact Paul Steenkiste at pws ‘at’ stanford.edu.