The Stanford duo each played key roles for the Cardinal's NCAA Division I National Championship season in 2010 and the new doubles teammates captured the ITA All-American tournament title earlier this fall, making them the No. 1 seed in the USTA/ITA National Indoor Championships. Muller-Wehlau, who finished the 2009-10 season as the top-ranked doubles player in NCAA Division II with graduated senior Martina Beckmann, teamed with Krtickova to go 2-1 on the week at the USTA-Billie Jean King National Tennis Center.
"We had a bit of a game plan [against Stanford], but nothing complicated," Armstrong head coach Simon Earnshaw said after the match. "We wanted to give them as many volleys, especially low volleys, as we could and we didn't want to use the lob as a bail-out option. I think we thought it was important that at any opportunity to win a point, we had to execute it cleanly. We barely missed a return all match.
"We were down 4-2, close to being down two breaks," Earnshaw said. "But we held that game and we started to play a little more loose. We led 6-4 but when Stanford came back to 6-6, we had a little realization that 'we might win this', but Alida and Barbora played tough. They took the match on the first match point making the perfect finish to the fall season for the girls.
"That's the first time we've played Stanford with any teams or players. They are in Division I, what we hope to be in the near future in Division II."
The opening-round loss to the Yale duo at the USTA/ITA National Indoor Championships is the only loss suffered by Muller-Wehlau and Krtickova this fall season (11-1) and they will start the 2011 spring season as the top-ranked doubles duo in NCAA Division II.
With play wrapping up in New York, the Armstrong women's tennis team will break for the rest of the fall and return to action on February 4-6 at the Clemson Winter Classic in Clemson, S.C.
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