Marathon Billiards Match Ends Day Four; 72 Players Remain

Marathon Billiards Match Ends Day Four; 72 Players Remainby Rick DavisThe Thursday evening matches from the 9 p.m. and 11 p.m. were running late, although for the tournament directors, only one match became an issue as far as timing when Antonio Gabica and Chris Bartram, who after three hours and forty-five minutes, managed to finish their match just before 3 a.m. Through the evening a quartet of seeded players received their pink slips. Tang Hoa, Allen Hopkins, Charlie Williams, and Fabio Petroni each took their final loss late in the evening.Discuss the U.S. Open 9-Ball ChampionshipU.S. Open 9-Ball Championships image galleryU.S. Open 9-Ball Championships Tournament Brackets A new gauntlet is set as each round brings the players higher into the payout. Of course, some players just can’t stand the sunlight, as the 11 a.m. round saw Steve Moore skip ahead when his opponent, Justin Cone, failed to appear for their match. Meanwhile, Scott "The Freezer" Frost made his match by about 30 seconds as he was buttoning his shirt as he walked to the table and it appeared that getting in no warm-up time hurt him—he looked to be out of stroke as Brian Parks controlled the match until the 11-4 finish.
Shock and awe described the other matches as nearly all of them had major players fighting to stay alive. Santos Sambajon Jr. eliminated Ronnie Wiseman 11-4, while Tony Robles did the same to Kim Davenport 11-8. Robles was down 4-2 early on then tied the match at 4- and then 7-all before beginning to surge ahead. Robles commented afterwards, “It feels good to play up to my capabilities for a change. Yesterday I had a horrible day, and I was fortunate to win my watch double-hill. I had a lot of time to think last night, and I felt one-hundred percent today. I was behind a couple points in the match but I caught up and then just didn’t miss a ball.” A few other matches were tough to call at first, although in the end the scores spoke for themselves. Dee Adkins eliminated Tony Watson 11-5, and Gandy Valle did the same to seeded Rodney Morris. Steve Lillis eliminated another seed, Jason Miller, 11-6, while Lee Heuwagen eliminated another seed, Markus Juva, 11-8. The final match in the round was a lengthy battle between Dave Howard and Jeremy Jones, where Howard knocked out the seeded former U.S. Open champion 11-9 after two and a half hours. One o’clock matches saw mixed results for the seeds, while some of the crowd favorites continued to play strong. "Machine Gun" Luc Salvas and Shannon Daulton each won again, while Steve Moore bested Dee Adkins and Lee Van Cortezza eliminated Hall of Famer Nick Varner 11-5. The TV table featured Sweden's Marcus Chamat’s comeback from behind to eliminate Jose Parica 11-7. Going into the 3 p.m. round there are 18 seeded players still alive out of the remaining 48 overall, the bulk of whom will return to play in the evening rounds, where many must finally face off against each other to be among the top 20 to return Saturday. Visit InsidePOOL for the latest news in the sport of billiards and pool.

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