Being the longest-running women's-only tennis tournament in the world, the Bank of the West Classic, held on the courts of Stanford University in California, always gathers many top players to battle for some important ranking points. The tournament also marks as the first leg of the US Open Series for the women, a string of tournaments held in North America leading up to the final major of the year - US Open in New York. 

The first quarter

Defending champion Serena Williams' deplorable withdrawal from the event left Caroline Wozniacki as the top seed in the draw. The Dane world number five receives a bye straight into the second round - just like all of the top four seeds - where she is scheduled to contest on Thursday against the winner between Mirjana Lucic-Baroni from Croatia and Uzbek-born American Varvara Lepchenko. Wozniacki's projected quarterfinal opponent is German Andrea Petkovic who faces a promising young talent, Carina Witthoeft also from Germany, in the first round before possibly taking on another countrywoman, Mona Barthel, in the second round.

The second quarter

Karolina Pliskova and Madison Keys are headlining this section of the draw, seeded fourth and seventh respectively. Both have been enjoying career-best seasons so far, Pliskova's year highlighted by a title in her home town of Prague and three more Premier finals while Keys made the semifinals at the Australian Open and the quarterfinals at Wimbledon. Pliskova's draw in Stanford is far from easy as the Czech starts against either a qualifier or another German in the draw, Sabine Lisicki, against whom she is 0-3 down in their head-to-head. The American Keys' draw has pitfalls of its own; she starts her campaign with a tussle against her US Open conqueror, Serbian Aleksandra Krunic

The third quarter

The seeds in the third quarter are Spaniard Carla Suarez Navarro and Ukrainian Elina Svitolina. Suarez Navarro, ranked number ten in the world, is having a great season but is coming off a tame performance at Wimbledon where she easily fell to Latvian wild card Jelena Ostapenko in the first round. The Spaniard seeded number three has a favorable draw here in California though and could rekindle that spark which carried her into the top 10 when she faces the winner between Tatjana Maria and Alison Riske. Should she advance to the quarterfinals, she faces one of Svitolina, a qualifier or the explosive yet inconsistent Frenchwoman Caroline Garcia.

The fourth quarter

The final quarter of the draw is another intriguing one and includes the likes of Agnieszka Radwanska and Angelique Kerber. The world number seven, Radwanska, is set to begin her quest for the trophy on Wednesday against a qualifier or Catherine "CiCi" Bellis, a 16-year-old American wild card who upset the reigning Australian Open finalist Dominika Cibulkova at the US Open last year. Kerber kicks off her tournament against the rapidly-improving Daria Gavrilova, who was ranked outside the top 200 in January but is now inside the top 50. The German world number 13 has already won three Premier titles this season and is the defending finalist in Stanford which goes to show that she likes these conditions.

Predictions

Semifinals: Wozniacki d. Keys, Kerber d. Suarez Navarro

Final: Kerber d. Wozniacki

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