KENNEBUNK – A doubles win by Windham’s Devon Pelletier and Logan Cummings over Kennebunk’s state champion paring of Christian Elkington and Sam Hickson couldn’t help the fourth-ranked Eagles (10-4) oust the top-seeded Rams (14-0) in the semifinal round of the Class A tennis tournament on June 6 as Kennebunk triumphed 4-1. The loss marks the end of Windham’s campaign to repeat as state tennis champions, albeit with a roster that was – aside from a single returner – wholly different from the team that took the title in 2010.

“This year was definitely a success,” said Windham Head Coach Wayne Martin. “If you had told me last year that after losing six out of your seven starters and getting six brand new faces that we would be 9-3 and in the semifinals against an undefeated team with a chance to win, I would have thought you were crazy. These guys wanted to form their own identity this year, and it could have easily been one of those things where Windham has had their day, and their day is over. But we’ve got a big core of our group coming back next year, and they’ll remember this.”

It will be easy for Martin to utilize Monday’s outcome as motivation – the Eagles played hard, but they were exposed against a Kennebunk team that has been the cream of the league this year. The Rams swept all three singles matches, with sophomore Josh Behrens defeating junior Tyler Nadeau in straight sets early by a score of 6-0, 6-0, senior Alec Sandmire taking a hard-fought victory against senior Ben Richardson by a final tally of 6-3, 6-2, and junior Charlie Merry closing out the day for Kennebunk with a 6-0, 6-2 victory over junior Ryan Johnson.

“We had all the confidence in the world coming in as the first seed, so now we just have to keep it up,” Sandmire said. “Scarborough is (coming up), and they are probably the second best team in the league, although we beat them in the regular season. We’ll probably see them in the finals if everything goes as planned. And if we get through Scarborough, we’ll probably play Lewiston, and they are a very good team.”

The Sandmire/Richardson match was actually marred by a fair amount of controversy, as Richardson was obviously irked by a number of line faults that Sandmire appeared to commit, but Richardson did not feel were clear enough to call. As the match wore on, these doubts seemed to cloud Richardson’s play, and he faded in the second set.

“He called some of the line shots out that I thought were in, but that kind of just fired me up when I came back with like four aces there,” Sandmire said. “(During the break, coach (Thomas) Post said) just keep up the good work, and don’t let the calls affect you. It was nice just to have the first set down, and have a little cushion so I could relax.”

“I believe – and I had a lot of other people tell me this – that he was foot-faulting considerably,” Richardson countered. “But if I watched his feet, then I would miss the ball. And if I don’t see him doing it perfectly, 100 percent clearly, then I have to call it in. So I kind of had this struggle between calling feet and following the ball. But he’s a good player. I just think that if I had somehow gotten my brain around that struggle, I would have done better.”

The lone Windham highlight of the day came as the doubles team of Pelletier and Cummings won their match by a score of 6-4, 7-6. Elkington and Hickson had previously prevailed at the state doubles tournament (and had been undefeated to that point), but were unable to overcome Windham on this afternoon.

“Devon and Logan are our most outstanding players – and Devon is back next year; he’s a junior,” Martin said. “But they’ve been real solid for us; they are our anchor, and they have been leaders on our team on and off the court. They do things the right way, they win the right way, and they’re really fun to watch. It’s too bad they didn’t pull it off in the doubles tournament, but these are the matches that count.”

With the majority of the team returning next year, Windham will look to make another run at a title in 2012 with a far more experienced team.

“You don’t want history (like today) to repeat itself,” Martin said. “We’ve had some down times, and we’ve had some great times, and we always bounce back.”

“It was a good season,” added Richardson. “We have a really great team this year. We actually had only one returning varsity player. This year was actually a little difficult for me personally, because I injured my hand, and I was out for part of the season. But I think I learned a lot about tennis and got a lot better.”