The Stanford women’s tennis team (20-1, 8-0 Pac-10) entered the Pac-10 Championships with six players in the main draw and came away from a successful weekend with runner-up finishes in both singles and doubles. The tournament’s No. 1 seed, junior Hilary Barte, was runner-up in singles and earned a runner-up with senior Lindsay Burdette in doubles.
After a dominating doubles performance against USC that clinched the Pac-10 title outright, the team started its individual matches full of fire. Stanford had the most individuals in the singles bracket. Five of the six players in the draw advanced to the second round. Veronica Li fell to No. 5-seed Andrea Remynse 6-1, 2-6, 6-4 in the first round.
“It was really nice to see all my teammates in our draw,” Barte said. “With six of us in the main draw, it was nice to look around and see all those Stanford shirts.”
In the second round, Stanford suffered a few closer losses that could have gone either way. No. 7 seed Mallory Burdette fell to unseeded Micaela Hein from Arizona State 6-3, 7-5. No. 6 seed Mari Andersson from California took out senior Lindsay Burdette 6-3, 6-1, and in the most back-and-forth match of the day, junior Carolyn McVeigh lost to No. 3 Marina Cossou from California 1-6, 7-5, 6-4.
“We had some matches where it didn’t go our way,” Lindsay Burdette said. “Like Mallory’s match, even though she played unbelievable, the other girl had a better day.”
With Stacey Tan and Barte still in, the two were forced to meet in an all-Stanford quarterfinal. Tan had already fought through a tough three-setter in the first round before winning in straights to get to the quarterfinals. Meanwhile, Barte breezed through her two opponents, losing a total of four games. While this meant Stanford was guaranteed at least one semifinalist, it put the two players in an uncomfortable position.
“Playing Stacey in the quarters, it was not a good feeling to be playing my teammate,” Barte said. “I wanted her to do well, but then again, I wanted to do well. It was like playing my sibling. That was not a fun match because it was a bad situation.”
Barte ultimately prevailed 6-4, 6-1 to secure her place in the semifinals. The seeding had held up fairly well throughout the tournament. The final four was No. 1 Barte, No. 2 Yasmin Schnack from UCLA, No. 3 Cossou and No. 6 Andersson. In the opposite semifinal, Schnack defeated Andersson 7-5, 6-2 to advance to the finals. Barte advanced 6-2, 6-4 past Cossou to set up a UCLA-Stanford championship match against Schnack.
“I played her at Americans, played her in the season, so yeah, I knew it was tough,” Barte said of Schnack. “She has a really good game that matches up against mine, so it’s always pretty difficult.”
In the championship match, Schnack came out firing. In her senior season, she downed Barte 6-4, 7-5 to notch her first victory over Stanford’s top player in four meetings this season.
Doubles supplied less success for the team overall, but provided a great display of the doubles talent between Barte and Lindsay Burdette. With three teams in the tournament, only one made it out of the first round. The No. 4 freshman tandem of Mallory Burdette and Tan fell to Arizona’s Natasha Marks and Claire Rietsch 8-4. Next, unseeded Veronica Li and Carolyn McVeigh fell to Danielle Lao and Alison Ramos of USC 8-6.
Barte and Lindsay Burdette cruised through their side of the draw. They defeated a UCLA pair 8-1 in the first, a pair from California 8-4 in the second and a duo from Washington 8-5 in the semis. Facing them in the final was Barte’s rival in the singles, Schnack, and her partner Andrea Remynse. It proved to be a No. 1 versus No. 2 matchup in which Schnack continued her recent spectacular play. Stanford was only able to win one game in the championship match, losing 6-1, 6-0 to earn a runner-up finish.
“My hat goes off to them because they played so well,” Lindsay Burdette said. “They did not give us one opportunity to sneak in there and they just did not stop. We definitely didn’t come out like they did and they just kept it up throughout the whole thing. I was proud of the way Hilary and I just kept our heads up and kept trying to find a way to crack them even though it was really tough at times.”
With a two-week break until NCAAs begin, the team looks to use the time off to perfect its game and take advantage of the time to relax their minds.
“Honestly, it’s a mental break,” Lindsay Burdette said. “It feels so good to know that we have two weeks to break any part of our game down that wasn’t doing so well or just continue working on the things that we do well. It’s great to have that chunk of time.”