Jeffrey De Luna has been a well-respected and successful competitor from the Philippines for a little over 10 years now. Exactly 10 years ago, he climbed to #37 on our Money Leaderboard, having chalked up victories in the Manny Pacquiao International 9-Ball Open (defeating Dennis Orcollo in the finals) and the World 9-Ball Challenge (a Philippines vs. The World team event, in which he and four others, including Ronnie Alcano, defeated a World team), both in the Philippines. On the weekend of February 25-26, he visited Janet Atwell's room, Borderline Billiards in Bristol, TN, to join 65 other competitors on the Viking Cues' Q City 9-Ball Tour. Sporting a lofty handicap that required him to win 13 games before many of his opponents had to reach 9 games or less, De Luna went undefeated to claim the title.
De Luna's opponent in both the hot seat match and finals, Brandon Kidwell, was racing to 8 in games against him, and though he was soundly defeated in their first encounter, he forced a deciding game in the finals. Getting into the hot seat match, De Luna had shut out Brandon Helton, as Kidwell was busy sending Robbie West, west, 8-4. De Luna claimed the hot seat with a 13-3 victory over Kidwell.
On the loss side, with players racing to sometimes half (or less) the number of games De Luna had to win, Helton picked up Ikey Maynard, who'd defeated Randall Bowman and Bryan Pate, both 7-3, to reach him. West drew Doug Schulz, who'd eliminated Tim Krigler 8-2, and Shane Wolford 8-5. Maynard downed Helton, who was eliminated having chalked up only a single rack (to Maynard) in his last 21 games (giving up 13 to De Luna and 8 to Maynard). West, in the meantime, defeated Schulz 6-4.
West took the quarterfinal match 6-2 over Maynard, before being shut out 8-0 by Kidwell in the semifinals. That strong semifinal showing led Kidwell into the finals for a second shot against De Luna. The match went double hill (12-7) before De Luna completed his undefeated run to claim the event title.
Tour director Herman Parker thanked Janet Atwell and her staff at Borderline Billiards, as well as title sponsor Viking Cues, Delta 13 Racks, AZBilliards and Professor Q Ball. The next stop on the Viking Cues' Q City 9-Ball Tour, a $500-added event, scheduled for this weekend (March 4-5), will play out on the Diamond 'bar box' tables of Cue Time in Spartanburg, SC.
