TENNIS: THACHER LOSES IN FINAL H.-W. JUNIOR FALLS AGAIN TO BOYAJIAN.

Byline: ERIK BOAL Special to the Daily News

The standing ovation from the crowd of roughly 2,000 spectators Sunday at Kalamazoo (Mich.) College was a fitting acknowledgement of one of the greatest finals in the 91-year history of the USTA National Hard-Court Championships.

Unfortunately for Ryan Thacher, the applause served as only a temporary distraction following one of the most heartbreaking losses of his young tennis career.

Thacher, a junior at Harvard-Westlake of Studio City, relinquished a three-game lead and squandered three match points in the final set of the boys' 16-under championship match, resulting in a 7-5, 2-6, 7-6 (5) setback to top-seeded Brennan Boyajian.

It marked Thacher's third loss to Boyajian (Weston, Fla.) in the past four months, including setbacks at the Easter Bowl finals in April and in the 16-under Intersectional Team Championships in July.

The second-seeded Thacher led a first-set lead slip away, but rebounded to even the match by winning the final three games of the second set.

After Boyajian took an early lead in the final set, Thacher responded by winning five of the next six games and served for the match at 5-2.

Boyajian, who attends Cypress Bay High, saved a match point en route to breaking Thacher, then fought off two more in his next service game to hold to cut the deficit to 5-4.

Boyajian broke Thacher at love in the 10th game to tie the score and saved two break points to regain the lead 6-5.

Thacher demonstrated his resolve by holding in the 12th game to force a tiebreaker. But despite saving one match point, he couldn't battle all the way back from a 5-1 deficit as his final shot sailed long, allowing Boyajian to prevail in the nearly three-hour battle.

Barte bounces back: Harvard-Westlake senior Hilary Barte rebounded from a semifinal loss at the girls' 18-under nationals in San Jose to record a 2-6, 6-4, 6-3 third-place victory over Madison Brengle (Dover, Del.) at Almaden Valley Athletic Club.

``I was pretty unprofessional about my attitude (in the first set)because I was (angry) that I wasn't playing in the final,'' said Barte, who suffered a 6-4, 7-5 setback Saturday to champion Lauren Albanese (Coral Springs, Fla.).

Barte, who reached the final four as an unseeded entry, believes her performance against Albanese -- who defeated Ashley Weinhold 6-3, 6-0 in Sunday's final -- combined with her third-place finish could result in her receiving a wild-card berth to the U.S. Open qualifying draw in two weeks.

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