Note: Correction appended.

BEIJING — Brooklyn native Keeth Smart staged two come-from-behind rallies to secure an unexpected silver medal for the American men’s sabre fencing team here, but the third improbable surge he mounted fell short as America lost to France last night in the Olympic gold medal match.

In a nerve-racking day of action, the American squad secured the silver by beating formidable teams from Hungary and Russia, each by a razor-thin, 45-44 margin. In both matches, the U.S. trailed as it entered the final bouts, where Smart deftly reversed the deficit and scored the winning touch.

RELATED: Fencing Captain Brings New Perspective to His Third Olympics.

“I’m going to be finished fencing today and this is the best ending I could ever dream of. Ever since I was a little kid, I’ve always dreamed of an Olympic medal,” Smart, 30, told reporters last night. “I’m still on a high, a real emotional high.”

The victories were particularly sweet for Smart because they offered a chance to make amends for his role in the team’s losses at the Athens Games four years ago. Smart was on the piste there as the U.S. fell to France, 44-45, on a disputed call. He later allowed a 40-35 lead over Russia to swing to a single-touch loss at the hands of the same world-champion fencer he faced down yesterday, Stanislav Pozdnyakov.

“It’s been four long years of heartache that we’ve had to relive over and over,” Smart said.

“This basically hurt him as a human being for like a year and a half or so. And he thought he was going to quit fencing. He looked at himself as a failure because of that,” a top American fencing official, Jeffrey Bukantz, said. “He was able to slay the dragon of Athens and that was the most important thing. … It was so important for Keeth Smart to recover from the devastation that he faced four years ago.”

Smart faced more than his share of hurdles this year, even before he arrived in Beijing. In the spring, he was hospitalized and lost two months’ training after contracting a rare blood disorder, which he may have picked up at a tournament in Algeria. In May, he lost his mother to cancer.

However, he had a thrill yesterday as his sister, Erinn, won a silver on the women’s foil fencing team. “Watching my sister win a medal and coming back the next day to win a medal myself, it’s exhilarating,” Keeth Smart said. Also on the medal stand last night were the American fencers Tim Morehouse, 30, Jason Rogers, 25, and James Williams, 22, all of whom train under coach Yuri Gelman at the Manhattan Fencing Club on 39th Street.

“There’s not that many Olympians from New York City, so we’re proud to bring these medals home,” Morehouse, a Teach for America teacher who grew up in the Bronx and now lives in Irvington, said.

In the gold medal match, France opened with an early, 5-1 lead over the U.S. in the first bout, fenced by Morehouse. Smart, who followed, battled so aggressively that he almost fell off the piste. He netted one touch over the French, despite some communication problems with the coaches due to bright television lights. Morehouse struggled in his second bout, giving up a net of four touches to France before getting back on track with an even bout later. Williams, a reserve fencer tapped for the gold medal match, had one even bout, while ceding five touches to the French in his other rounds.

Heading into the final contest, the American closer, Smart, faced the daunting task of overcoming a 40-28 French lead without allowing France to reach the winning score of 45. For a time, it looked he might pull off his third coup of the day. Smart scored six touches in a row against the French, including one he picked up by appealing for a video review, but in the end the French fencer, Julien Pillet, landed the few touches he needed to win the match and the gold, 45-37.

Silver in hand, Smart is set to leave Beijing today to start at Columbia Business School, but his teammates still hope he’ll consider a comeback. “Tearing apart those closers … they didn’t know what to do,” Morehouse said. “He could definitely fence another four years and win another medal if he wants to.”

Correction: Algeria is where Keeth Smart may have contracted a rare blood disorder while attending a fencing tournament. A story on page 1 of yesterday’s New York Sun misstated the location.