No. 22 Stanford women’s tennis (12-3, 6-0 Pac-12) will travel north this weekend to face Pac-12 rivals No. 37 Washington State (20-3, 5-2) on Friday and Washington (13-9, 3-4) on Saturday, in the team’s third and second to last meets of the regular season.

Having defeated No. 26 Oregon (12-8, 3-5) in a home meet last Sunday in their eighth straight win of the season, the girls are poised to best the Washington schools by a comfortable margin.

Against Oregon, the Cardinal sophomores stood out, as Emily Arbuthnott (20-6 overall) secured the fifth clincher of her season and Emma Higuchi (19-6) triumphed with seven wins in a row. Star freshman, No. 15 ranked Michaela Gordon (19-6) suffered a close upset at the hands of No. 81 Alyssa Tobita, potentially predictive of postseason competition to come. Playing doubles, junior Melissa Lord and freshman Janice Shin snagged a valuable 6-3 win and provided Lord’s third consecutive victory after recovering from an injury.

Although the Cardinal is on a winning streak, and despite having only lost to three teams, all ranked in the top ten of the country, the team’s success will depend upon the strength of its headliners as the girls prepare to secure their third consecutive Pac-12 title two weeks from now.

In particular, performances by No. 54 juniors Caroline Lampl and Kimberly Yee (10-2 overall, 9-1 duals) as well as Arbuthnott and Gordon (14-3, 6-2) will be crucial to securing victories this weekend in the doubles category.

Following the weekend in the Pacific Northwest, the Cardinal will hit the courts on April 20 to host unranked California (8-6, 4-2) just before the Pac-12 championships from April 25-28 in Ojai, California.

Stanford will face Washington State Friday at 1:30 p.m. in Pullman, Washington. Stanford then travels to Seattle to face the Huskies at 12 p.m.

Contact Sylvia Ashford at sylviash “at” stanford.edu