The saying goes that it's the third time that's the charm. But when you're the No. 2 team in the nation, so are the first and second.
The second-ranked women's tennis team (4-1) completed a perfect three-match road swing this weekend, defeating Indiana 8-1, Ohio State 9-0 and No. 16 Notre Dame 8-3 on three straight days.
Although both Indiana (5-1) and Ohio State (8-1) provided little more than an afternoon practice for the Blue Devils, head coach Jamie Ashworth was more than happy to escape from South Bend, Ind., with a four-match win streak.
"We got out of this weekend the way we wanted to," Ashworth said. "We knew we had two easier matches to start with, two we should win, and a tougher one to finish. We had to play well to win; Notre Dame is the best team we've played. Even though William & Mary may be ranked higher, Notre Dame is better."
Playing before a hostile crowd, and at the same site as last year's NCAA tournament, the Blue Devils fell behind early, dropping the first two matches. But a Vanessa Webb rout at No. 1 and three-set victories by Kristin Sanderson, Megan Miller and Kathy Sell pushed Duke out to a 4-2 cushion it would not relinquish.
"[Sanderson] won a huge match for us momentum-wise," Ashworth said. "[Sell and Miller] won huge matches to put us up 4-2 where we could've easily been tied at three or losing. Those three really played well in tough situations.
"There are not many teams who have a chance to go into Notre Dame and win. It was great for us to go in and show that we can prove ourselves with a full lineup."
For the Blue Devils, the weekend's focus was more on improving for the upcoming National Team Indoor Tournament in Madison, Wisc., the nation's second-biggest team tournament behind only the NCAAs.
But not everything went exactly according to plan.
While Duke had no problem figuring out the formula for victory, figuring out a formula for a doubles lineup remained elusive. Although Webb and Karen Goldstein remained the team's top tandem in all three matches, the bottom two Duke seeds switched up among five different players.
"We're trying to find three doubles teams that can win if we're down 4-2," Ashworth said. "That's one thing we didn't get out of this weekend that we wanted to. We need to find that lineup to have confidence to know we can pull it out if we need to."
The remainder of the Blue Devil agenda played out equally as well as Ashworth planned it, something the third-year head coach thinks will carry over into this weekend's Indoor Tournament.
"We were trying to put pressure on people, make them make mistakes," he said. "We were trying not to give away free points, to be aggressive and not just sit at the baseline. And we did that, and if we do that this weekend, we will get the kind of results we expect."
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