“We watched how they warm up, how they set their feet; they’re so good,” senior Greg Balter said. “We learn from the best in order to be the best.”

And that’s Lowell’s mantra for the new season: “Be the best.” The team has been working harder than ever in the preseason in order to reach new heights in the postseason.

“We want to keep the championship title,” senior co-captain Alex Le said. “But we haven’t gotten past the first round of NorCals in a while.”

Le and the two other senior co-captains, Max Sidorov and Brent Lee, will be leading the march to NorCals, but the team’s biggest strength could be in the underclassmen. Sophomore Antony Bogodist looks to defend his first AAA crown and continue his quest to match ’05 alumnus Kenzo Hirakawa-Wong’s spectacular feat of winning the title in each of his four years in high school.

Another sophomore, Frank Lu, returns much improved from his freshman year. A doubles champion with Class of ’06 alumnus Vadim Zakiyan last season, Lu has been working with his own coach and been playing in a lot of tournaments in order to get into top form. “Frank and I made a pact to play doubles together at All-City to keep his title,” Le said.

Even the freshman class is unusually strong, according to Le. “We’re better than last year because we have a lot of decent freshmen,” he said.

The team’s talent is undisputable, but it means nothing without proper coaching, and that’s where PE teacher Terence Doherty and Class of ’02 alumnus Jimmy Rosenheim come into play. Doherty, the head coach, has been working extensively with the JV squad to prepare for the coming years. Rosenheim, the assistant who worked miracles with the girls’ championship team in the fall, is at it again with the boys. He’s increasing their endurance through a difficult regimen of exercises including windsprints, running around Lake Merced and the ever-tortuous “Indian run,” in which the last player in line must run around the track until he catches up with the team as it continues to jog. Le described Rosenheim as “a good coach who’s devoted a lot of time and makes sure we have no-nonsense workouts.”

With the entire season looming in front of them, Balter remarked about the other thing he picked up from the pros on Feb. 16 “A couple of them went crazy and threw their rackets 30 feet into the air and broke them in two,” he said. “Maybe that’s what I need to do.”

The Cardinals’ next game is at 3:15 p.m. on Feb. 27 against Mills.