The No. 14 Stanford women’s tennis team (17-5, 7-3 Pac-12) earned two victories this weekend in front of an energetic home crowd to advance to the NCAA Championships Round of 16. The Cardinal first shut out Stony Brook 4-0 on Friday before easing by No. 19 Pepperdine on Saturday.

The Cardinal, who have remarkably appeared in the postseason every year since 1981, simply proved too much for Stony Brook (15-2, 5-0 America East) despite their strong season. The Cardinal locked up the doubles point early behind victories by Carol Zhao and Taylor Davidson on Court No. 1 and Caroline Doyle and Ellen Tsay at the No. 2 spot. Both doubles teams rank in the top-10 in the country and have proved invaluable to the team this year.

With a 1-0 lead, Stanford quickly overwhelmed the Seawolves in singles play, dropping a total of five games in three matches. Carol Zhao, the No. 2 player in the country, clinched the victory for the Cardinal with a 6-2, 6-1 win over Polina Movchan.

On Saturday, Stanford faced Pepperdine (18-7, 8-1 WCC) in a rematch of a dual meet on April 10 at Taube Stadium. The Cardinal dominated the Waves 6-1 when they last met, and this match proved no different. The team again earned the doubles point with victories at the No. 1 and 2 spots. The Waves stole back a point at the No. 6 spot, which Pepperdine’s Christine Maddox defeating Lindsey Kostas 6-2, 6-2. However, the Cardinal bounced back with straight-set victories at the Nos. 4 and 5 spots to go ahead 3-1. Zhao, Stanford’s stalwart No. 1, again provided the clincher for the team, with an impressive 7-5, 6-3 dismantling of Lorraine Guillermo, the No. 9 player in the country.

Zhao, who is 20-2 at the No. 1 spot for Stanford this year, spoke highly of the team’s performance.

“We’re very pleased with our progress so far – we’ve had very strong performances throughout the entire lineup in singles and doubles against two tough teams and have shown that we are ready for the challenges coming up,” she said.

Indeed, the Cardinal will face an immense challenge in the next round against Cal, one of the team’s biggest rivals. The Golden Bears are ranked No. 3 in the country, and have an extremely high-caliber lineup, including Maegan Manasse and Klara Fabikova, the No. 4 and 18 players in the country, respectively.

The meeting with Cal is an exact rematch of the NCAA Round of 16 last year, in which the Cardinal escaped with a thrilling 4-3 victory over their rivals. Cal swept the season series this year, with a dramatic 4-3 victory at Taube and a 5-2 triumph across the bay. However, the Cardinal seem to enter a different gear every year during the postseason and will look to do the same in the next round. In 2010, the team won the NCAA championship as the No. 8 seed. The team bettered this feat two years ago in one of the most impressive runs in women’s college tennis history, winning the tournament as the No. 12 seed while beating No. 5 USC, No. 4 Georgia and No. 1 Florida along the way. Clearly, the team is capable of winning big in the postseason, and a win over Cal could earn them the status of legitimate title contenders.

“Cal is a very familiar opponent, and we have a lot of respect for them,” Zhao said. “We know we have what it takes, and we’ve been working hard all year to reach this point. We’re ready – rising to challenges is what we’re all about.”

The Cardinal will face Cal this Friday at 10 a.m. in Waco, Texas.

Contact Neel Ramachandran at neelr ‘at’ stanford.edu