YARMOUTH – Ben Cox hit the serve with such force, the tennis ball popped.

Already trailing by a break after four games of the men’s championship of the 22nd Betty Blakeman Memorial tennis tournament Sunday afternoon, Brian Powell picked up depressurized ball and, with a wry grin, held it up for Cox to see.

Additional Photos

Maise Silverman of Brunswick endured a 3-hour, 15-minute semifinal Sunday morning, outlasting Curran Burfeind of Falmouth for a 3-6, 6-4, 6-4 victory. Photos by Derek Davis/Staff Photographer

Brian Powell and semifinal foe Brian Mavor have both won seven Blakeman titles, but this year Ben Cox of Vero Beach, Fla., won it.

Brian Mavor of Yarmouth hits a return against Brian Powell of Kennebunkport during their men s semifinal Sunday at the 22nd Betty Blakeman Memorial tennis tournament in Yarmouth. Powell won 6-1, 3-6, 6-1 to reach the final.

“Game penalty,” announced Powell, a seven-time champion of the event. “It’s a special Blakeman rule.”

Cox laughed.

“He wasn’t buying it,” said Powell, 41, of Kennebunkport.

Even without the ol’ kidding ball trick, Powell managed to inject some pressure back into the match, holding five set points in the first before Cox came through with a 7-6 (13-11), 6-3 victory for his second straight Blakeman title.

“He played great,” said Cox, 31, a resident of Vero Beach, Fla., who is the head pro at Portland Country Club in Falmouth and played collegiate tennis at Michigan, “which was fun and frustrating at the same time.”

A crowd of several dozen tennis enthusiasts in lawn chairs ate up the back-and-forth action, particularly the extended tiebreaker in which the second-seeded Powell and the top-seeded Cox alternated winning the first 12 points. Powell had four set points in the tiebreaker to go along with another with Cox serving at 5-6, 30-40, but time and again Cox came up with a big serve or a winning forehand.

“He’s a special player, at a completely different level,” Powell said. “The pace is something I’m certainly not accustomed to seeing.”

The first set took 57 minutes all by itself, longer than it took No. 1 Chantalle Lavertu to win the women’s title — her first — over doubles partner and third-seed Maisie Silverman, 6-0, 6-2.

Lavertu is a Lewiston High graduate who will be a junior at Bowdoin this fall. Silverman, a rising sophomore at Brunswick High, was a finalist in the schoolgirl singles tournament this spring, an accomplishment that remained just out of reach for Lavertu, a four-time semifinalist who always seemed to find a Jania or an Ordway blocking her path.

Despite the five-year difference in ages, they’re buddies, having met four years ago. They even spent last week training together at the club on New Hampshire’s Lake Winnipesaukee, where Lavertu is teaching and drove to Yarmouth together for the tournament.

“I’ve never actually played her in a match, so that was pretty fun,” Lavertu said. “Of course, it helped that she had already played a three-hour match beforehand.”

Actually, it took 3:15 for Silverman to outlast No. 2 Curran Burfeind of Falmouth in a semifinal Sunday morning, 3-6, 6-4, 6-4. In the other semifinal, Lavertu dispatched Sadie Hammond of Belgrade, 6-3, 6-1.

“I’m older than the other three semifinalists combined,” said Burfeind, 50, after her match, with a tired chuckle. “Maisie’s 15, Sadie’s 14 and Chantalle is 20.”

In the final, Lavertu won the first seven points and needed only 23 minutes to claim the first set, dropping only two points on her three serving games. Silverman, however, achieved a break in the second game of the second set on a forehand winner near the end line and, after a pause to see whether Lavertu would call it out, raised her arms like a prize fighter to announce the score before serving: “One-all. I got a game!”

Even Lavertu cheered.

“She’s a good competitor, a great competitor,” Lavertu said.

Buoyed, Silverman held serve to go up 2-1 but that was it. Lavertu closed out the match by winning the final five games and capped it with a full-swinging forehand winner off a short lob she didn’t bother to let bounce.

“She’s such a good player,” Silverman said. “My goal was to get a game, but I got two, so that was even better.”

The hot and humid conditions, coupled with the lengthy semifinal, took a toll on Silverman, who wobbled into a tent support after the match and had to sit down for a while before receiving her runner-up plaque.

Powell also endured a three-set semifinal, against fellow seven-time Blakeman champ Brian Mavor of Yarmouth, the sixth seed. Powell won 6-1, 3-6, 6-1 and Mavor was down to his last racquet after strings broke on three others during their match.

In the other semifinal, Cox dispatched Bates assistant coach and No. 4 seed Greg Janssen, 6-1, 6-4 to set up his first meeting with Powell. They had played once before, but in a doubles match two years ago.

“I didn’t know he was an attacking player,” Cox said after the finals. “He hit a high percentage of first serves and I don’t know if he missed a volley all day. He just kept coming at me.”

Powell broke Cox to open the second set, but Cox broke right back. They held serve until Cox broke again to take a 4-2 lead. Powell survived three match points to hold serve and make it 5-3 before Cox finally converted his fifth match point.

“That was about the best I could do,” Powell said. “Ben is definitely a higher level player than I ever was.”

In the finals of the only other singles tournament, featuring men 55 and older, Mike DeLuca, 64, of Portland defeated Glenn Zaharis, 59, of Scarborough, 6-1, 6-2.

In men’s 55-plus doubles, Steve Sulzer of Union and Douglas Johnson of Camden rallied past Mike Currie of Falmouth and Peter Pitegoff of Yarmouth, 1-6, 7-6 (7-3), 6-1.

In mixed doubles, Mike Burke and Emelie Cloutier, both Lewiston High graduates, defeated Eric Blakeman of Yarmouth and Barb Neff of Falmouth 3-6, 6-2, 6-3.

In men’s doubles, top-seeded Cox and Matt Dana defeated No. 3 Rick and Adrian Garza of Austin, Texas, 6-4, 6-2. In women’s doubles, Lavertu and Silverman, the top seeds, won 6-1, 6-1 over the No. 2 team of Helen Boucher of Topsham and Elisa Whittier of Auburn.

All proceeds from the Blakeman go toward the Cancer Community Center of South Portland.

Staff Writer Glenn Jordan can be contacted at 791-6425 or at:

gjordan@pressherald.com

Twitter: GlennJordanPPH

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