Duane Toney wins closely contested Tri State Tour Stop

When a promoter is choosing ratings for a handicapped tournament, he knows he did a good job if a good number of the matches are close. The promoter's at the Tri State Tour's B/D event at Master Billiards in Sunnyside, NY on August 15th must have been ecstatic.

The final four on the winners side came down to Duane Toney vs Chris Luz and Andrew Kane vs Kris Karp with Toney scoring a 7-5 win and Kane advancing with a 7-6 win. Kane and Toney then matched up for the hot-seat, with Toney scoring a 7-6 win.

Luz and Karp made their way west to the one loss side where Karp scored a 7-4 win over TJ Smithers and Luz dropped a hill-hill match to Mike Panzarella. Keeping the hill-hill theme going, Panzarella then defeated Karp 7-6.

Panzarella then took down Andrew Kane 7-5 to set up a match with Duane Toney in the finals. Toney was getting two games in the race to seven finals, and he quickly raced out to an early 5-1 lead. Panzarella had played some great pool to get this far and he was not going home without a fight as he clawed back to trail by one at 5-4 and then tie the score at 6-6. All of that work would be for naught though, as Toney won the final game for the 7-6 win and $600 in first place prize money.

Panzarella settled for $300 in second place prize money.