No. 8 Alex Clayton and No. 3 Hilary Barte of the men’s and women’s tennis teams were both named the best freshmen in the country this year, recently taking home the 2008 ITA National Rookie of the Year awards. Despite the Cardinal men’s loss in the second round and the women’s loss in the quarterfinals, the freshman duo are still in Tulsa, Okla. as competition in the NCAA Individuals begins today.

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Alex Clayton #gallery http://daily.stanford.edu/image/full/9228
Jeff Keacher

Alex Clayton

Clayton will face Radford’s Martin Sayer in the first round today at 10 a.m. PT. Sayer is ranked No. 103 in the nation.

As for Barte, she will take on UNLV’s No. 36 Elena Gantcheva at 8 p.m. PT today. The other Cardinal player joining Barte in the singles tournament is No. 13 junior Jessica Nguyen, who is slated to go up against Miami’s No. 19 Laura Vallverdu at 9:30 a.m. PT.

Sophomore Lindsay Burdette will pair up with Barte in the doubles competition, too. The Barte-Burdette combo are 17-11 overall and ranked No. 9. Doubles will begin on Thursday when the duo faces Megan Moulton-Levy and Katarina Zoricic of William & Mary.

— Erik Adams