In her second tournament back on the Arizona Women’s Billiard Tour, Las Vegas’ Rebecca Wagner shook off the rust and came through the one loss side to win stop three at Main Street Billiards in Mesa, Arizona on June 4th – 5th.
Wagner was the top rated player in the event, and she had to earn each and every match win, as she was giving up 6-3 races in many of her matches. She made it past 6-3 races against Claudia Justus and Misty Anderson, but a 6-3 race against tour veteran Terri Johnson-McCauley was too much for Wagner to handle. “She came with some crazy good outs that I didn’t anticipate.” said Wagner.
Johnson-McCauley didn’t have too long to celebrate on the winners side, as she dropped her next match to eventual hot-seat occupant Kaitlin Stengel. Stengel followed up the win over Johnson-McCauley with a hill-hill win over Stephanie Martin and then a win against Simone Huskey for the hot-seat.
Back on the one loss side, Wagner ended Saturday with two hill-hill wins (both 6-3 races) over Jamie Hagerty and Joanne Mattingly.
Wagner’s Sunday started with a 6-5 match against Rae Evans, who had not lost a match through the first two AWBT events this season. That perfect record was brought to an end by Huskey on the winner’s side Saturday and Wagner was happy to end Evans’ weekend in 9th place after a hill-hill match.
Wagner went on to win four more matches on Sunday to get to the single elimination final against Stengel. As Stengel is still a bit of a newcomer to the tour, this was the first meeting between Wagner and Stengel, but Stengel said she was familiar with her opponent’s game. “I had never played Rebecca Wagner but I have had the pleasure of watching her shoot before. Rebecca plays an excellent game, striking when she has the opportunity and playing safe until she does.” she said.
For Stengel, the appearance in her first final on tour was proof that her hard work is paying off. “Mitch (Ellerman) was kind enough to give me a few pointers while playing some racks at Metro Sports Bar last week, and I’ve also been working with Jon Smith a bit in the last few months. Both of them have really helped me with my stroke mechanics, cue ball movement and practicing with intention” said Stengel. “Over the last 6 months I have been putting a lot of attention on my mental focus during competitions. I definitely think that this, along with a nice sprinkle of luck, was what made the biggest difference for me at this event”.
In the end, the finals appeared to come down to experience. For Wagner, a final match like this is nothing new, but for Stengel it was her first time in a situation like this. “ I think that the nerves of being up against such a high caliber player and the fatigue from a long weekend of pool definitely took its toll on my game” said Stengel. “The skill level difference got into my head and I didn’t approach my sequences in the same way I had for the rest of the weekend”.
Wagner won the extended final match 8-2 and while she says she thinks she is playing at maybe 80% of her game, she isn’t sure how many more events she will be able to get back out to attend in the immediate future. “I’m still working two full time jobs so probably not much time for competition but I’ll sneak an event or two in” she said.
Both Wagner and Stengel will have their next opportunities on July 9th – 10th when the AWBT travels to Pockets in Tucson, Arizona for stop #4.
Bustamante, Miller take Balls Only, Second Chance events
It was actually back-to-back victories on the Arizona Women’s Billiard Tour (AWBT) for her, albeit separated by 14 months. In November of 2020, with all of the tour’s host locations having closed thanks to the pandemic, Rae Evans-Taylor teamed with Brian Honoway to win the tour’s traditional season finale, a Jack and Jill Scotch Doubles event, hosted by Main Street Billiards in Mesa. One year and two months later, this past weekend (Jan. 29-30), the AWBT opened a new season at Bull Shooters in Phoenix and Rae Evans-Taylor, went undefeated to win the $1,000-added, 9-ball main event that drew 40 entrants to the room.
In a pair of concurrently-run events, Joven Bustamante came from the loss side to win a $250-added, BALLS ONLY 10-Ball event that drew 30 entrants and Sara Miller went undefeated to win a $250-added Second Chance event that drew 12.
Any thoughts that things might be a little different at the end of the 14-month hiatus were dispelled as Evans-Taylor faced two tour veterans in the hot seat match and finals of the 9-ball main event. Both of those veterans, Susan Mello and Nina Tagley, battled her to a double hill final game before she prevailed to claim the 9-ball title.
Evans-Taylor had gotten by Tracy Price, Jill Watson and Veronica Poore to arrive at a winners’ side semifinal against Jaye Succo. Mello, in the meantime, the first of the two tour veterans to face Evans-Taylor, had won a play-in preliminary round over Jodi Hirning and then sent Crystal Parada, Mari Simonson and junior competitor Kennedy Meyman to the loss side to meet up with Jamie Hagerty in the other winners’ side semifinal. Nina Tagley had won her opening match against Colette Kruse, before losing a double hill fight to Amanda Pulley and embarking on a seven-match, loss-side winning streak that would see her compete in the finals.
Mello downed Hagerty 6-4 while Evans-Taylor defeated Succo 7-5. Evans-Taylor claimed the hot seat with a double hill win over Mello.
On the loss side, Hagerty was the one who had the misfortune of drawing Tagley, who was, at the time, four matches into her loss-side trip, which had recently included victories over Marcy Thomas and Veronica Poore. Succo picked up Leandrea Gaff, who was also working on a four-match winning streak that was about to end. Gaff had just eliminated Amanda Pulley, double hill and Colette Kruse 6-3.
Tagley sent Hagerty home 7-1 and in the quarterfinals, faced Succo, who’d ended Gaff’s loss-side streak 7-2. Tagley stopped Succo’s loss-side wins at 1 with a 7-3 win in those quarterfinals.
Tagley and Mello battled in the semifinals, both of them looking for a rematch against Evans-Taylor in the hot seat. Mello had faced her most recently in the hot seat match of this event, while Tagley and Evans-Taylor had battled at other times and other places on the tour.
Tagley won the semifinal battle 7-3 over Mello. The finals were a straight up, extended race to 9 and proved to be the second double hill match of the event for both of them. Evans-Taylor dropped the last 9-ball and claimed the title.
Bustamante wins 7 on the loss side to win BALLS ONLY, Miller wins 4 to claim Second Chance
Joven Bustamante’s winners’ side journey in the 30-entrant BALLS ONLY, 10-ball event saw him give up five racks in two matches, losing the second match to a competitor (Adam Hanten) who only had to chalk up four racks to win, which he did. Bustamante’s subsequent seven-match, loss-side trip saw him give up a total of nine racks in seven matches; two racks, three times/one rack, three times and one shut out. He crowned this achievement with back-to-back shutouts in a true double elimination final over Robert Moreno, who’d been sitting in the hot seat waiting for him.
It was Moreno and Joey Barrera who battled for the hot seat in this one. It turned into a double hill fight that eventually sent Barrera to a doomed semifinal meetup with Bustamante. The two opponents who’d lost out in the winners’ side semifinals – Tim Biggs to Moreno 5-0 and Jesse Johnson to Barrera, double hill – moved to the loss side and walked right into their second straight loss.
Biggs lost to Avery Reece and Johnson ran into Bustamante, four matches into his loss-side streak. Bustamante downed Reece in the quarterfinals 7-1 and began a 21-0 streak that saw him defeat Barrera once in the semifinals and Moreno twice in the finals.
Sara Miller’s run through the 12-entrant Second Chance field was a breeze by comparison. She dropped three opponents 4-2 to claim the hot seat and then defeated one of those three (Kaia Fujimoto) a second time, double hill to claim the Second Chance title.
Fujimoto was Miller’s first and last victory (4-0). Miller was Fujimoto’s second and eighth opponent, representing both of her losses (6-2).
Miller’s third opponent, Mari Simonson, battled for the hot seat, but as the victim of Miller’s third 4-2 victory in a row, she moved to the semifinals to be shut out by Fujimoto. Jill Watson, who’d been defeated by Miller 4-2 in a winners’ side semifinal, survived a double hill fight versus Barbara Lee on the loss side, lost a double hill, quarterfinal match to Fujimoto and finished 4th.
Tour representatives thanked the ownership and staff at Bull Shooters, as well as sponsors Realty One Group, A Best Billiards, Las Glorias Grill, Goober Pet Direct, Your Way Logistics, Idle Hands Vintage, Sophia’s House Cleaning, Avalon Home Performance LLC, Big Time Threads and Friends of the AWBT. The nest stop on the AWBT, scheduled for March 5-6, will be hosted by Griff’s in Las Vegas, NV.
