KAILUA — This Blue Moon Men's Night Doubles final began with a bang for Mikael Maatta and Jan Axel Tribler. It ended with a blowout for Wei-Yu Su and Minh Le, winners and still champions at Kailua Racquet Club.

Su and Le became only the second team in the 38-year history to three-peat last night when they defeated Maatta and Tribler, 6-2, 6-2, in the teams' third straight final. The last two years the former Hawai'i Pacific All-Americans fell in three close sets. This year it was over the moment Maatta and Tribler could not hold the service break they played so flawlessly to earn in the first game.

Maatta ripped the night's first return down the line past a poaching Le. Team Europe — Maatta came here from Sweden and Tribler from Denmark — broke Su's big serve at love for their ideal start. From there, it was all Team Asia — Su came here from Taipei in 1995 to play for Brigham Young-Hawai'i and Le was born in Vietnam, raised in Sacramento and played for Cal before spending the last six years on Japan's pro circuit.

After surviving a heart-stopping three-set semifinal against fourth-seeded Michael Bruggemann and Erich Chen Friday — "We probably shouldn't have even been here," Le admitted — Su and Le came out looking rested and remarkably quick to claim the $3,000 first prize.

After the early hiccup, they broke Tribler's serve in the next game and never trailed again.

"I'd been serving so well the whole tournament and suddenly I don't get a first serve in until the last game," Tribler said. "Nothing really worked."

Both teams felt that second service break was the most crucial moment in the match.

"The key was breaking back right away and getting back the hold," Le said. "Especially in tennis you go in spurts. We cut their momentum off and got back on track."

Le and Su got two more service breaks the first set and broke Maatta twice in the second to win in 50 minutes.

"At the beginning," Su said, "I think they thought they've got it. When we broke right back it made a big difference."

It might have been the most one-sided of the last three championship finals, but what it lacked in drama it made up for in sheer entertainment.

Le slashed across the net and knocked off winners from sick angles as he and Su made a conscious effort to be more aggressive than they had in the past against the Europeans. The little guy on the team also stood tall on the service line, never getting broken and opening up opportunities for Su at net.

Meanwhile, the 6-foot-3 Su proved he could play large and small. After the first game he was never in trouble again on his serve. The former BYUH All-American launched more than a few overheads over the fence and into the Kailua night. And, in a move at the net so stunningly graceful it silenced the crowd, he returned Tribler's volley from point-blank range between his legs early in the second set.

By then Maatta and Tribler, financial advisors for Guardian Life, had no answers for two guys who both recently started working in information technology — Su at Punahou and Le for a firm in Japan.

"It's all mental, playing them," Maatta said. "We just tried to relax tonight. We've been too tight in the past."

That didn't work either. Worse yet for the opposition, Su and Le don't look like they are going away anytime soon.

"Every time I come here I feel more love," Le told the crowd, "even though I'm not a local boy."

The only other team to three-peat in the history of Night Doubles was Peter Isaak and Kendall Char, who won three of their five titles from 1982 to '84.

NOTES

Third-seeded Ikaika Jobe and Bryan Wooten claimed third place, and $1,000, by defeating two-time Night Doubles champs Michael Bruggemann and Erich Chen, 8-5. The difference came on the lone service break at 6-5.

Kaua'i's Brad Lum-Tucker won the Peter Isaak Memorial Sportsmanship Award. Torin Ching, Thomas Shubert and Mikey Lim earned the Sam Caldwell Amateur Awards for being the amateurs to advance the furthest. All three reached the quarterfinals.

This year's tournament benefited the Mike Mackinnon Fund and Boys and Girls Club in Kailua.