Rams’ Brown upsets top 2 seeds, outlasts Potvin

PORTLAND – At 17, Bryan Brown is an old hand at baseline tennis.

But serve and volley? That’s a relatively new addition to his arsenal, but when Brown rededicated himself to attacking the net during the third set of Thursday’s state singles final it proved pivotal as the Bangor High junior outlasted freshman Eliot Potvin of Hampden Academy 6-4, 0-6, 6-3.

“Really I’m just getting into this attacking thing,” said Brown, a quarterfinalist each of the last two years. “So it’s hard for me sometimes to remember to actually serve and volley or just follow my shot to the net.

“But it makes it so much easier if you can hit an approach shot and put away a volley. It saves you a lot of energy, and I did a better job of that in the third set.”

The win capped off a day in which the fourth-seeded Brown knocked off the tournament’s two top seeds. In the semifinals, he ousted No. 1 Garret Currier of Cape Elizabeth 6-0, 6-3. In the championship match he overcame the second-seeded Potvin, who had defeated Brown twice earlier this spring.

“I really didn’t have a goal,” said Brown. “I just wanted to come out, play well and have fun. I think I did that.”

His third meeting with Potvin, held at the Waynflete School athletic complex, was essentially a play with three distinct acts.

In the first act, the players held serve to a 4-3 Brown lead, but three consecutive breaks – two by Brown – earned him the set.

Potvin responded with second-act domination, using his serve and baseline strength to quickly even the match.

“I just got fired up,” said Potvin. “I was in the zone, I was hitting everything.”

But the break between the second and third sets allowed Brown time to regroup strategically, and perhaps stifled Potvin’s momentum.

“In the third set I didn’t get fired up at all,” Potvin said. “I was kind of flat, and he definitely came out with more intensity than I did and that made the difference.”

Brown earned the critical break of Potvin’s serve in the fourth game of the final act to take a 3-1 lead, then broke again for 5-1. Potvin broke back and held to draw within 5-3, but Brown served out the match at love, each time using the serve and volley – once inducing a wide lob by Potvin and three times putting away shots at the net, including on match point.

“I was obviously disappointed in the second set,” Brown said, “but Eliot played really well. Also in the second set I was going for it. Off his first serve I would go for a winner, and you can’t do that.

“I just came out and tried to play better in the third set and attack more.”

An attacking strategy also served Brown well in his semifinal win over Currier. Brown won a succession of lengthy games to sweep the first set, then fell behind 3-0 in the second set before reasserting himself at the net to win the final six games.

“Garret has so much topspin you have to move up and short-hop the ball,” Brown said. “He had so much topspin that the ball landed short, and I was able to take advantage of that and hit approach shots and do pretty well at the net.”

Potvin needed just 53 minutes to earn a 6-1, 6-3 semifinal victory over No. 3 Sam Maurey of Cape Elizabeth.