While the season finished for most of the women's tennis team with the University Athletic Association Championships held April 26 to April 28 in Orlando, Fla., there are two members of the squad whose seasons will culminate in a trip to the season's showpiece occasion.

On May 8, Faith Broderick '13 and Carley Cooke '15 received news that they had been selected to participate as a doubles tandem in the NCAA Division III Championships.

The duo will compete in Kalamazoo, Mich. from May 23 to May 25.

"It's a great bookend to Faith's four-year career," said women's tennis coach Ben Lamanna. "We were exchanging a series of very triumphant text messages when we found out the news. It was a great day."

"I couldn't ask for two better girls to work with. They're tough, competitive, work very well together and have great sportsmanship towards their opponents."

The last Brandeis women's tennis players to compete in the tournament as a duo did so in 2005. In that year, Abby Lerner '05 and Colleen Donnelly '08 made the trip to the NCAA Championships as a doubles pair.

Last year, Broderick and Cooke compiled a 14-5 record as a pair and were alternates for the 2012 NCAA Championships. In the 2013 competition season, the duo is currently 12-5 and earned All-UAA Second Team honors following the aforementioned UAA Championships.

This season, the pair boasts a .500 record against other doubles pairs who have been selected to the NCAA Championships, having competed against two other selected duos. Broderick and Cooke downed the Middlebury College senior duo of Brittany Faber and Leah Kepping, 8-5, while they fell 3-8 to Williams College pair of junior Cara Shoemaker and sophomore Rebecca Curran.

While the duo's most recent accomplishment has to do with their performance as a tandem, each player has put together a distinguished singles career, too, for the Judges.
Cooke made a name for herself as a first-year at Brandeis, as she qualified for the NCAA Championships and was named All-American, and, in doing so, became the first women's tennis player in the program's history to receive that honor.

As a four-year player who featured in both major tennis categories, Broderick has her name attached to over 105 singles and doubles wins combined.

A certain deal of waiting is to be expected before the championships, as teams have time to work on the mechanics of their game free from organized competition. In the meantime, Lamanna is working with the pair on the very basics of their game.

"After finals, we worked on getting the cobwebs out. We did a lot of work on drilling technique. My assistant coach, Pauri Pandian, and I have been playing doubles with them. Not only have they improved over their performance level from last year, they've really learned to trust themselves. Trust has been key for their increased success this year."

Given the toughness involved in qualifying, simply making it to the tournament would be a major accomplishment for most collegiate athletes and might result in complacency on the big stage.

However, Lamanna is optimistic that Broderick and Cooke can make a strong showing and mix it up with some of the premier doubles pairs that Division III tennis has to offer.

"They can play some really great ball," he said. "When they are on their game, they play really clean ball. We're in a very competitive region, the New England Region, and they are a very good pair in our region. Williams was the top-ranked doubles pair, Amherst College was second, we were third and Middlebury was fourth. Carley and Faith played against Williams and Middlebury which were both tough matches. For them to be among the top doubles pairs in the region is really remarkable."

The two will compete on 3 p.m. Eastern Standard Time on Thursday. Who they will face has not yet been determined.
Lamanna added that livestreaming may be available for those interested from NCAA.com. However, the availability of the stream will be dependent on whether the court on which Broderick and Cooke will be play on will have a television camera or not.

For all he has observed them and all of the intricacies that he has noticed, however, Lamanna put together a succinct sentence that describes the performance of the duo: "They're damn good."