Burdette tennis legacy will live on at Stanford

The Burdette legacy will live on at Stanford. Mallory Burdette, the top-ranked women’s tennis player in Georgia, verbally committed to the Cardinal program according to tennisrecruiting.net.

Burdette will be the third member of her family to attend and play tennis at Stanford, following older sisters Erin and Lindsay.

Burdette reached the semifinals of the USTA National Open 18 Division after beating top-seeded Danielle Collins, 7-5, 4-6, 6-4, on Sunday in Tampa, Fla. She was scheduled to meet Brittany Dubins in Tuesday’s semifinals.

Mallory and Lindsay Burdette were a doubles team in junior tennis. In September, Mallory and partner Sloane Stephens, made the finals of the U.S. Open’s junior girls doubles tournament. She will be joined by fellow Stanford recruit Stacey Tan, who ranks second among seniors in California and fourth nationally.

Tan, who will graduate from Lakewood High, and Burdette are both blue-chip prospects who have played in USTA Challenger events.

Tan is currently ranked a career-high 618th on the WTA Tour. She reached the finals of an ITF event in St. Joseph’s, Mo., in August.

St. Ignatius senior Natalie Dillon also gave her verbal commitment to Stanford. She’s been ranked in the top 10 among Girls’ 18 in Northern California and the top 50 in California.

Dillon was named co-MVP of the West Catholic Athletic League as a junior last spring.

Baseball

Stanford junior right-handed pitcher Jeffrey Inman has been named by Baseball America as a preseason third-team All-America selection. Inman is Stanford’s top returning winner after going 7-2 with a 4.27 ERA in 2008.

Inman ranked second on the Cardinal’s College World Series staff for wins, innings and starts last year, while he held right-handed batters to a .246 average (35-for-142). He followed up his sophomore collegiate campaign by striking out 34 batters in just 31.1 innings for the Yarmouth-Dennis Red Sox, and was tabbed by Baseball America as the ninth-best prospect in the 2008 Cape Cod League.

Stanford, which is ranked as high as No. 5 in national preseason polls, is scheduled to open its 2009 campaign with four home games this weekend at Klein Field in Sunken Diamond. The Cardinal will host Vanderbilt for single games on Friday (5:30 p.m.) and Saturday (1 p.m.) before welcoming UC Riverside for a Sunday doubleheader (noon), weather permitting. Rain is scheduled for the weekend.

Men’s tennis

Stanford sophomore Alex Clayton received the Intercollegiate Tennis Association (ITA) Sportsmanship Award Sunday at the ITA National Men’s Team Indoor Championships, hosted by the University of Illinois at Midtown Tennis Club.

Clayton was chosen for this annual award by the 16 participating coaches for displaying outstanding sportsmanship and exemplifying the spirit of college tennis during the course of the Team Indoor Championships as well as throughout his career.

Clayton plays No. 1 singles and No. 3 doubles for the Cardinal. He is currently ranked No. 33 in the ITA national singles rankings with a record of 17-4, while he and partner Bradley Kahn have accumulated a 5-2 record in doubles. Stanford advanced to the semifinals of the ITA National Team Indoors with victories over No. 7 Florida in the first round and No. 2 Texas in the quarterfinals before being eliminated.

Clayton is the sixth Stanford player to win this award in the 18 years it has been presented and the first since 2002.

Women’s basketball

Stanford junior center Jayne Appel was named the U.S. Bank Pac-10 Women’s Basketball Player of the Week for Feb. 10-16. Shooting 70 percent from the field (7-10), Appel helped No. 5 Stanford beat Bay Area-rival and third-ranked California, 58-41, moving the Cardinal into a tie for first in the conference.

Stanford is ranked No. 4 this week in the Associated Press Top 25.

Appel recorded her 10th double-double of the season, leading the team with 22 points and 14 rebounds in Stanford’s 25th-straight home victory, currently the third-longest win streak in the nation. She was key in the Cardinal’s second-half run. After scoring a season-low 18 points in the first half, Stanford went on a 30-4 run, mounted by Appel scoring six consecutive points to secure the Cardinal victory. The national player of the year candidate scored 17 of her 22 points in the second half.

Matched up against California’s three-time All-Pac-10 pick Devanei Hampton, Appel also stood out defensively, limiting the former Pac-10 Player of the Year to seven points in the contest.

Appel, who ranks second in the conference in scoring with 15.7 points per game, increased her league leading field goal percentage to 62.8, which ranks in the top five in the nation, as well.

The Cardinal snapped Cal’s school-record 12-game winning streak, the fifth-longest in the country. The Bears and the Cardinal are currently tied at 11-1 atop the Pac-10 standings. It is the seventh Pac-10 Player of the Week honor for Appel and the fourth time she has earned the honor this year. It is also 66th all-time for Stanford.

Next up, Stanford hosts the Oregon schools as the Cardinal plays Oregon State on Thursday at 7 p.m. and Oregon on Saturday at 2 p.m.

Women’s lacrosse

Stanford’s Annie Read, a sophomore goalie, helped the Cardinal to a 20-1 victory over Fresno State and the fewest goals allowed in a single game in 10 years. And, for her efforts, Read was named Mountain Pacific Sports Federation’s Player of the Week for the week of Feb. 9-15.

Read faced only four shots and made three saves, but two were excellent saves late in the contest. One on a breakaway and another on a free-position shot helped the Cardinal maintain what would have been a rare shutout until the waning moments.

In two games — her first starting assignments as a collegian — Read has allowed only six goals and has made 10 saves. Read became the second Stanford player in as many weeks to receive the honor, after Dana Lindsay did a week ago for her four goals in a season-opening victory over Oregon.

Stanford (2-0) next plays visiting Albany on Wednesday (3 p.m.) and then No. 2 Syracuse on Friday (3 p.m.) in the showcase home game of the regular season. Syracuse is 1-0 under second-year coach Gary Gait, considered by many to be the greatest player in lacrosse history.

Men’s volleyball

Brandon Williams, a senior middle blocker out of Bellarmine Prep, was named the volleyball co-Player of the Week by the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation for the week of Feb. 9-15.

Williams had season highs of 10 kills and eight blocks and hit .667 to lead No. 8 Stanford to a 30-18, 28-30, 30-25, 30-24 victory over undefeated and second-ranked Pepperdine on Friday at Maples Pavilion.

Williams had a block on the opening point to help the Cardinal bolt to an 18-4 first-set lead. Stanford was able to sustain the momentum throughout the match, largely with the help of Williams, who helped the Cardinal compile 17.5 blocks as a team. With the victory, Stanford ended a 16-match losing streak to the Waves that began in 2001.

Williams also had five kills, three blocks and a .364 hitting percentage in a three-set loss to USC on Saturday. For the week, Williams had 15 kills, 11 blocks and a .538 hitting percentage. Williams’ block total in those two matches accounted for half of his season total of 22.