After winning four Big Ten titles in four years, coach Claire Pollard and the Northwestern women’s tennis team has begun to define its success by how it performs in the NCAA tournament.

“For players like them that have achieved so much, this is what we play for, big weekends like this,” Pollard said of the team’s opening matches this weekend. “We want to be in the NCAAs, and now we’re looking at them as the measurement of how successful we are.”

The No. 15 Wildcats will host Illinois-Chicago on Saturday in the first round of the tournament, with the winner advancing to play either Notre Dame or Wisconsin on Sunday. The regional will be held in Evanston for the second straight year.

The unranked Flames (17-11) were given an automatic bid to the tournament after winning the Horizon League title for the sixth straight season. Although the Cats defeated Illinois-Chicago 4-0 in the first round of the tournament last season, Pollard said the team isn’t looking past the Flames.

“They won their conference, and any team who does that is doing something right,” Pollard said. “I think everyone understands that without Saturday there is no Sunday.”

Both the Badgers and Fighting Irish would like a rematch with NU, which knocked off Wisconsin in the Big Ten tournament title match and defeated rival Notre Dame 4-3 earlier this year.

The No. 21 Irish shut out the Badgers 7-0 on March 1, but Saturday’s rematch could be a different story.

“I’m sure Wisconsin was disappointed to lose to them,” Pollard said. “Although it was 7-0, on the whole it was a pretty tough match. It’s a new part of the season, and Wisconsin has a bitter taste in their mouths after Big Tens, so I’m sure they would like another crack at us.”

Like the Cats, Notre Dame has advanced to the Sweet 16 the past two seasons. As NU’s biggest rival and the second-best team in the Midwest, a Sunday showdown with the Irish would test the Cats.

“It’s going to be a war if we play Notre Dame on Sunday, ” NU junior Marine Piriou said. “It’s a pretty huge rivalry between us, so it’s going to be intense and very competitive, but that’s what we want. We want a challenge.”

Piriou said the tournament provides the Cats’ with a chance to gain respect as one of the country’s best programs.

“We’ve proven we’re the best team in the Midwest, but we don’t have any top five or top 10 teams in the region,” Piriou said. “Right now is definitely the time to prove that we belong with the nation’s elite.”