For the past three years, Emma Higuchi was home schooled. So it’s been quite the adjustment, since during the past month the Stanford freshman has been getting her education on and off the tennis court.
“Just being in a classroom with other students, having a professor and the whole environment is I guess kind of new to me, even though I was in high school,” Higuchi said. “But I was looking forward to that and I’m enjoying it. And obviously the team, it’s different from coming in from an individual sport and coming into a school and having teammates.”
Tuesday afternoon at the Taube Family Tennis Center, she was vying to become the seventh straight Cardinal to claim the singles title at the ITA Northwest Regional. Past winners include current WTA pros Carol Zhao and Nicole Gibbs.
But Higuchi had to settle for the runner-up plaque after a 6-2, 6-2 loss to Cal junior Karla Popovic, who hails from Croatia.
“I think what Emma showed us is that she can play a lot of styles,” Stanford coach Lele Forood said. “Not quite today could she go toe-to-toe with the power that Karla brought, but she beat a lot of players in a lot of different ways this past week.”
At 5 feet, 2 inches tall, Higuchi understands that versatility is a key component of her game.
“Since I’m not very tall, I knew I couldn’t be one dimensional,” Higuchi said. “So I focused on being able to do everything, just being able to adjust.”
That’s one of the reasons she caught Stanford’s attention.
“She’s such a calm player, she’s a great competitor and she actually has a lot of skills,” Forood said. “So it’s going to be really easy to game plan against her opponents this year because she can do so many styles.”
Her path to the singles final included a victory in the quarterfinals over Stanford senior Caroline Doyle, who retired in the third set with a quad strain. Then in the semifinals, she prevailed 6-1, 4-6, 6-2 over Caroline Lampl, a sophomore at Stanford.
“That was a tough one,” Higuchi said. “It’s always hard to play a teammate and I had never experienced that.”
“That’s what happens in regionals,” Forood said.
Higuchi also lost to Popovic earlier in the month 6-0, 6-4 in the singles final of the Saint Mary’s Invitational. Did she see herself reaching the singles finals of her first two collegiate tournaments?
“Oh no, I did not imagine myself,” said Higuchi, who was texting updates to her parents since they’re currently in Japan. “I just kind of played in each match like, ‘OK, this is good experience. Just play your game.’ And I guess it kind of worked.”
It’s also likely that early success on The Farm will result in a shuffling of the lineup when dual matches get started on Jan. 19.
“No idea at this point,” Forood said. “It’s going to be interesting for us to figure out what the lineup is going to look like, but we won’t be figuring that out until January.”
Lampl and fellow sophomore Kimberly Yee dropped a third-set super-tiebreaker in the doubles final 6-2, 6-7(5), (10-8) to Cal’s tandem of Popovic and Olivia Hauger.
Missing in action for the Cardinal was Taylor Davidson, as the top returning singles player had to withdraw from the tournament at the last moment.
“We were playing without some of our top talent in this tournament,” Forood said. “So that figures in.”