The boys’ tennis team has had amazing season so far, remaining undefeated as of March 20 with a record of 11-0 overall and 6-0 in the De Anza league.
Since emerging as champions of the Fresno Tennis High School Classic in early March, the team has faced little opposition, winning every match 7-0 or 6-1.
On March 20, the team remained undefeated with a 6-1 beating of Los Altos. Previously, they’d scored victories over Palo Alto 6-1 on March 18 and Lynbrook 7-0 on March 13.
The reason for the recent success has been the overall depth and talent on the team, said sophomore Karthik Padmanabhan, who plays No. 2 singles.
“The key success to our team has to do with the strength and flexibility,” said Padmanabhan. “We have so many strong players that also play doubles that are highly ranked nationally.”
The team’s No. 1 singles player, junior Neel Bedekar thinks the biggest challenge will be dealing with injuries as the team has had to deal with them, however, with a full lineup the team should be very tough to beat.
“Our biggest challenge will most likely be to keep all of our players healthy, as we've had numerous injuries in the past, but with a full lineup, we would be a very tough team to beat,” Bedekar said.
Junior co-captain Vikram Ramesh, who plays No. 2 doubles, said that the only school that will give the team some trouble is Menlo High School.
“Menlo High School is one of the top teams in the nation and we will most likely face them if we get deep in CCS,” Ramesh said.
Bedekar said that the team wants to continue to remain undefeated in order to attain the No. 1 seed for CCS.
With half the season over, Ramesh has high expectations for the rest of it.
“The team is performing its best this year compared to my previous two years on varsity and I feel like we can go far in CCS and hopefully go to NorCals,” Ramesh said.
Saratoga played at Lynbrook and Los Altos on April 1 and 3 respectively, but due to printing deadlines, these games could not be in the print edition of the Falcon.