Junior Carlos Cueto has helped his team notch 17 dual victories over his two years at Cal.
One school missing from that list is Stanford.
In fact, Cal has not topped the Cardinal for a full two years. Its last win came Feb. 20, 2010, when the unranked Bears upset the No. 8 Cardinal 4-3. That means a majority of the players on the current roster have yet to experience a Big Slam victory.
Saturday brings yet another opportunity for Cueto and the No. 13 Bears (5-4) to try to end the drought. They’ll travel to Stanford to face the No. 9 Cardinal at 1 p.m. at the Taube Family Tennis Stadium for the first of two matches, the other being Cal’s regular season finale on April 20.
The Bears recently returned from the ITA National Team Indoor Championships in Charlottesville, Va., where they fell 4-0 to No. 4 Georgia in the first round.
As such, the pressure to return to the team’s winning ways is growing. Cal’s last consecutive victories came against San Diego on Jan. 30, but since then, its record against top-tier teams has been less than stellar. Case in point: the Bears have yet to topple a top-10 opponent. Even more concerning, four of their next five opponents are in the top 15.
Considering those factors, the weight of this match seems overburdening. Nevertheless, Cueto doesn’t believe there’s additional pressure for him or his teammates to perform well.
“You always want to be beat Stanford, but when you consider schools like UCLA, USC, Pepperdine and all the California schools, you want to do well against all of them,” Cueto said. “Yes, they’re a big rival, but for all of the matches you go in with the same attitude. This one you might just be a little more excited for.”
Statistically, the match appears very equal. In fact, neither team has a ranked singles player. However, Cal can look to seize the doubles point behind its No. 4 duo of senior captain Nick Andrews and junior Christoffer Konigsfeldt and the No. 16 pair of Cueto and sophomore Ben McLachlan. Stanford does not have any ranked doubles team.
Even so, Cal coach Peter Wright recognizes how dangerous the Cardinal (8-4) can be. In the ITA Indoor Championships, Stanford decisively beat No. 7 Baylor and No. 6 Kentucky. Its only loss in the tournament came against No. 2 Virginia in a 4-1 decision. All-American senior Bradley Klahn, though unranked, played well in close losses to the No. 1 and No. 13 players in the nation.
If anything, Wright considers the circumstances and pressure as nothing new. In his 19th year at Cal, he believes the key to winning will be the same.
“There’s not necessarily additional pressure, but there is additional excitement around the event,” Wright said. “Our guys will focus on what they need to do to be successful and let the hype around the match take care of itself — we just need to take care of what happens in between the lines.”
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