Over the last six months, Chieh-Yu Chou of Chinese Taipei has put together a pretty impressive resume.
After earning a silver medal for her runner-up performance at last year’s World Games in Birmingham, Ala., she won the second-annual Predator World Women’s 10-Ball Championship in Austria, besting fellow countrywoman Tzu-Chien Wei in the finals with a commanding 9-3 performance.
Playing in the championship match of this weekend’s Kamui WPA Women’s World 9-Ball Championship, she somehow managed to top that performance, taking advantage of a couple of opportunities left by Allison Fisher early and blanking her opponent, 9-0, at Harrah’s Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City. Chou, who earned $30,000 for the win, becomes the first female competitor to hold the world titles in both 9-ball and 10-ball since Kelly Fisher in 2012.
“I’m very excited and it’s like a dream,” said Chou after the match. “The last 16 I thought I was going to lose and I won 9-8. I feel very lucky. I focused and continued my game so I’m really happy.”
After Chou climbed onto the scoreboard first with a victorious safety exchange in the first rack, the Fisher had a chance to even the score but missed a sharp cut on the 9 ball. Her opponent clicked the ball in to take a two-game lead, then broke and ran twice to increase her advantage to 4-0. Fisher returned to the table in the fifth game when her opponent failed to pocket a ball on the break but couldn’t find a clear shot at the 1 ball and opted to exchange safeties, which Chou took advantage of when her opponent left an open shot. Chou cleared the table then broke and ran twice more to increase her lead to a commanding 7-0.
“Today I was very comfortable so I was very focused,” she said.
That’s putting it mildly. She used another victorious safety on the 6-ball to climb onto the hill then used a tight cut shot on the 1 ball in to the side pocket to break to break-and-run once more and close out the championship match in a lightning fast 49 minutes.
“If you had asked me at the beginning of the week if I would like to be in the final, I would be quite pleased with it,” said Fisher. “No one wants to lose nine nil, but I couldn’t do anything about it.”
The victory ended the surprise run by Billiard Congress Hall of Famer Fisher, who had become a bit of a sentimental favorite after reaching the quarterfinals and pulling off an upset of young Filipino Chezka Centeno Saturday night. Playing another rising young star in Russia’s Kristina Tkach in the semifinals, the two competitors split the first 10 games until Tkach rattled the 5 ball in the corner pocket. Fisher cleared the table, then used a safety to force her opponent into a foul and tacked on a break-and-run to pull within one rack of the win.
After Fisher failed to pocket a ball on the break, the Russian attempted to pocket the 1 ball in the side and missed. After Fisher followed that miss with a foul after attempting to kick at the ball, Tkach worked her way through the balls and, with the 9 ball hanging near the corner pocket and the 6 and 7 balls further up the rail, elected to try a combination shot and missed. Fisher approached the table and began pondering her next shot but, failing to realize she had already used her time extension, was forced to drop, aim and fire at the ball as the shot clock was about to expire. She missed and Tkach began clearing the table but missed a makeable 9 ball in the corner pocket, allowing Fisher to rattle the ball into the corner pocket for the victory and a ticket to the finals.
Chou reached the finals by erasing an early deficit to South Korea’s Seo Seoa in the first semifinal of the day.
After taking an early 2-1 lead, Chou missed a jump shot on the 3 ball in the fourth rack. Seoa took full advantage, clearing table and winning the next five games to grab a 6-2 advantage. Standing at the table in the ninth rack, the South Korean attempted a safety on the 1 ball that left an opening which Chou walked directly through, winning three straight to cut the deficit to 6-5 before missing the 5 ball in the 12th rack. Seoa tacked on another win but left another opening in the next rack that allowed her opponent to see the 3 ball after a safety. Chou connected with the ball, then watched as the cue ball knocked the 9 ball into the corner pocket to pull within a game again.
“When I saw that ball, I thought there might be chance,” said Chou. “When I made that I said, “okay, my luck is coming. That was a turning point.”
Chou broke and ran twice to take the lead then used a safety exchange on the 1 ball to close out the match.
A Billiard Congress of America Hall of Famer with the last name of “Fisher” will be competing on the final day of the Kamui WPA World Women’s 9-Ball Championship but it isn’t the player most people were expecting.
Kelly Fisher’s four-year reign as defending champion came to an end in the most frustrating of ways, missing a pair of shots down the stretch after building a late lead to fall 9-8 to Seo Seoa of South Korea in the quarterfinals of the championships Saturday night at Harrah’s Hotel and Casino in Atlantic City.
After Fisher fought her way to a 9-4 victory in the round-of-16 against Melanie Sussenguth of Germany, she found herself trailing to Seoa throughout the first half of the match until she used a jump shot to clear the table and cut the lead to 6-5 then pocketed the 9 ball on the break to tie the match. Fisher had the opportunity to take lead in the next rack but scratched in the corner pocket, allowing Seoa to briefly regain the lead until she scratched on the break in the subsequent rack.
After Fisher climbed onto the hill with a victorious safety exchange in the 15th game, she appeared to be in position to clear the table and close out the set but missed a makeable 5 ball. Seoa used a combination shot on the 9 ball to tie the match and appeared to be in control of the deciding rack before she missed a makeable 8 ball in the corner pocket. Fisher banked in the object ball but then missed the winning 9 ball, allowing Seoa to pocket the ball after the two traded missed shots.
Seoa heads to the semifinals will face Women’s World 10-Ball champion Chieh-Yu Chou, who survived her round-of-16 match against Woojin Lee, 9-8, then cruised to the semifinals with a 9-2 victory over South Korea’s Jin Hye Ju.
As Kelly Fisher was being eliminated, fellow Hall of Famer Allison Fisher was turning back the clock a bit, defeating Chezka Centeno, 9-7, in the quarterfinals. Fisher jumped out to an early lead and maintained the momentum, carrying an 8-5 advantage until the Filipino tacked on a couple of games to close the gap to 8-7. Centeno had another opportunity in the 16h game after Fisher played a safety but she failed to contact the 2 ball with her kick shot, giving her opponent ball-in-hand and a pathway to close out the match.
“I can’t even believe it. It was a dream,” said Fisher of her win. “I dogged a couple of balls at the end there and I got really fortunate,”
Fisher’s opponent will be Kristina Tkach, who erased a two-game deficit down the stretch to defeat Jasmin Ouschan in the round-of-16 then gutted out a 9-7 win over Chihiro Kawahara in the quarterfinals.
Ouschan built an early 4-1 lead and had a chance to increase her lead further but missed the 2 ball. The Russian replied, winning the next three games to tie the score before missing a cut shot on the 1 ball. The Austrian returned serve by winning four of the next six racks to take an 8-6 lead and climb within one shot of the win. Ouschan, who has twice finished second the event, appeared to be in position to clear the table in the 15th game but missed a 3 ball in the corner pocket and gave her opponent new life.
“To be honest, I thought I was done,” said Tkach. “She gave me another chance and I thought ‘well, I will just go with the flow.’”
The flow allowed her to clear the table and break-and-run to tie the match, then finish off the comeback when she missed the 2 ball in the corner pocket only to watch as it rolled into the corner pocket on the opposite side.
Facing Kawahara in the quarterfinals, She built an early 4-1 lead but got uncomfortable in the chilly tournament room and watched the lead disintegrate. The two competitors traded racks until Tkach took an 8-7 lead when her opponent scratched on the break. The young Russian appeared to be positioned to run out the rack in the 16th game until she mishit her shot on the 4 ball and suddenly found her path to the 5 ball blocked by the 6 ball. She pulled out her jump cue and methodically slammed the ball in, then finished off the rack to close out the match.
Play resumes Sunday morning at 10 a.m. local time with Chou facing Seoa in the first semifinal and Fisher taking on Tkach in the second match of the day. The finals are scheduled for 4 p.m. Coverage of the event is available on the CueSports International YouTube channel as well as on Billiard TV, which is available on Roku and other streaming devices.
In her second round match of the Kamui WPA Women’s World 9-Ball Championship, Jasmin Ouschan found herself trailing Billiard Congress of America Hall of Famer Karen Corr 4-0 in a race-to-seven before rallying to win the, 7-6.
The next night against Germany’s Melanie Sussenguth, the Austrian once again found herself staring up at a big deficit. This time, however, she was unable to pull off the late match rally, as the two-time World Women’s 9-Ball runner-up was defeated 7-2 in her winner’s qualification match Friday night at Harrah’s Resort and Casino in Atlantic City. Ouschan now moves to the one-loss side of the bracket in this 64-competitor, double-elimination tournament, where she will face the winner of the match between Caroline Pao and Xin Yu Hong Saturday morning.
After splitting the first four games, Sussenguth appeared to be in position to take the lead but left the 2 ball siting in the corner pocket’s jaws. With an open table, Ouschan could not capitalize as she overran position on the 9 ball and initiated a safety exchange which her opponent ultimately won. After the German used more safety play to tack on another rack, Ouschan had an opportunity to narrow the gap when her opponent scratched on the break but again failed to get out when she could not secure position on the 6 ball. After Sussenguth tucked the cue ball behind the 8 ball on a safety, Ouschan fouled when her attempt to jump the cue ball touched the blocking ball, handing Sussenguth ball-in-hand and a 5-2 advantage.
Ouschan had one last chance to make up some ground when her opponent failed to secure position on the 5 ball in the eighth game and the two traded safeties again. The Austrian went to her jump cue and popped the 5 ball into the corner pocket then she missed a cut shot on the 6 ball, allowing Sussenguth to take a commanding 6-2 lead. The German didn’t allow her opponent another shot, breaking and running to close out the set in the subsequent game.
In other matches from the winner’s side qualification, reigning champion Kelly Fisher pitched a 7-0 shut out over South Korea’s Woojin Lee, Filipino Chezka Centeno gutted out a 7-5 win against Rubilen Amit, Allison Fisher got by Eylul Kibaroglu, 7-5, and Pia Filler defeated Bulgaria’s Kristina Zlaveta, 7-3. Reigning World Women’s 10-Ball Champion Chieh-Yu Chou defeated Tani Miina, 7-1, Hye Ju Jin survived against Kristina Tkach, 7-6, and Japan’s Yuki Hiraguchi gutted out a 7-5 against Wan-Ling Wang.
Meanwhile, earlier in the day, it almost happened again to Margaret Fefilova Styer.
Playing Elise Qiu of France, she jumped out to a quick 4-0 advantage and was in the process of clearing the table in the fifth game when she missed a cut shot on the 6 ball. Qiu capitalized by winning the next three racks to pull within 4-3 and appeared positioned to tie the match but failed to convert a bank shot on the 6 ball. Fefilova Styer stroked in a long cut shot down the rail on the ball then finished off the rack to pull ahead by two games but forfeited the table again when she misplayed a safety on the 1 ball in the next game.
Qiu again took advantage of her opponent’s mistake, clearing the table then breaking and running to tie the match. Fefilova Styer left another chance in the 11th game after misplaying a safety but Qiu scratched in the side pocket after making the 2 ball. This would be the last time she would come to the table, as Fefilova Styer cleared the table to take a 6-5 lead and then broke and ran to close out the match.
Fefilova Styer had a bit of an easier time in her next match, defeating Veronique Menard of Canada, 7-4, and will face Kim Witzel of Germany when play resumes Saturday morning with eight matches from the one-loss side on Saturday at 10 a.m, local time. Live coverage begins at 10 a.m. local time on the CueSports International YouTube page as well as on Billiard TV.
Naoyuki Oi is earning a new set of fans here at Turning Stone, with his dominant play. Oi won his first two matches, over Ray Carey and Kristina Tkach, by a combined score of 18-0. Oi looked well on his way to keeping that record alive in this third match of the event, as he led John Morra 5-0 early in their match. Morra finally took advantage of an Oi miss and got back into the match, to eventually tie things at hill-hill before Oi pocketed the case ball for the 9-8 win. Oi will face the Ukraine’s Vitaliy Patsura at 2pm EST today.
Johnny Archer ended his Friday play with a convincing 9-6 win over Poland’s Mieszko Fortunski to remain undefeated. Archer’s first action on Saturday will be a match with fellow American Skyler Woodward.
Day one is complete at the Joss NE 9-Ball’s Turning Stone Classic XXXVI, and day one didn’t have much as far as major upsets. What it did have though, was a day of top 9-ball talent.
One match that saw a fan favorite sent to the one loss side was the 9-5 loss that Brandon Shuff suffered at the hands of Vitaliy Patsura, from the Ukraine. Shuff is back at it early on Friday with his one-loss side match against Randy Laborite. Patsura will face Ray McNamara in the noon round of play.
Oi and Tkach will face off on the main streaming table at noon EST, which is being streamed for free on Upstate Al’s Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/UpStateAL. Fans can follow all of the action online with our online brackets and real time scoring pages.
The Turning Stone Classic XXXVI kicks off today (January 5th) at the Turning Stone Resort & Casino in Verona, NY.
The event, once again, sees a full field of 128 players competing not only for $25,000 in added prize money, but also for valuable Nineball World Ranking Points.
The expression ‘household name’ implies that a given name is so well-known that common ‘households’ across a broad, geographic spectrum are aware of it. It is, by its nature, a culturally specific expression; a household in New York City is not likely to elicit the same ‘recognition’ responses as one in Taiwan. This takes on added significance in the international pool community, because even the most well-known competitors in any country are only likely to be recognized as a ‘household’ name in very specific pool-interested households.
The winner (Tzu-Chien Wei, aka The Shadow Killer) and runner-up (Meng-Hsia Hung, aka Bean Hung) in the WPBA Dr. Pool Classic II event, held this past weekend (Dec. 7-11) might be considered ‘household names’ in pool-interested households on the island of Taipei, but aside from their fellow competitors at the event, are not likely to be as well-known in pool-interested US households. In many cases neither are Kelly and/or Allison Fisher. The $20,000-added WPBA Aramith Dr. Pool Classic II drew 77 total competitors to the Central Wisconsin Expo Center in Rothchild, Wisconsin this past weekend and even among many pool-interested US ‘households,’ the names of Tzu-Chien Wei and Meng-Hsia Hung (both from Taipei) are not likely to be recognized. The six opponents that Tzu-Chien Wei faced and the 10 that “Bean” Hung faced are likely to not just recognize the names, but remember them, well. Their names are also likely to be elevated in the recognition department of the event’s 59 other competitors.
The event was broken up into two stages. A First Stage that put 45 competitors against each other in a double-elimination bracket that would advance 16 of them (eight from each side of the bracket) to a Final Stage double-elimination bracket against 32 competitors, 16 of whom had been awarded opening round byes. Tzu-Chien Wei was one of the 16 competitors who was awarded an opening round bye in the Final Stage. Meng-Hsia Hung was one of the First-Stage 45 and advanced through three opponents – Angie Londgren, Lisa Cossette and Emily Callado – to enter the event’s Final Stage. They would meet twice, hot seat and finals.
Wei opened her campaign against Emilyn Callado, downing her 8-4 before dispatching two very formidable opponents – Canada’s Brittany Bryant (8-2) and Russia’s Kristina Tkach (8-5) – and then, drawing Allison Fisher in one of the winners’ side semifinals. Hung, in the meantime, got by June Maiers 8-3 and Susan Williams 8-2, before locking up in a double hill battle versus Kelly Fisher, likely one of the WPBA competitors who was ‘favored to win’ (by any measure). Hung, if you’ll excuse the expression, hung on to win, advancing to defeat Margarita Fefilova 8-4 and draw New Jersey’s Dawn Hopkins in the other winners’ side semifinal.
Wei sent Allison Fisher to the loss side 8-6. Hung met her in the hot seat match after sending Hopkins over 8-3. Hung sent Wei off to the semifinals 8-5 and sat in the hot seat, awaiting her return.
On the loss side, Fisher drew Kaylee McIntosh, who’d lost a winners’ side quarterfinal versus Dawn Hopkins and then defeated Eleanor Callado 8-2 and Brittany Bryant 8-6. Hopkins picked up Austria’s Jasmin Ouschan, who’d lost her winners’ side quarterfinal to Allison Fisher. Ouschan then defeated Kyoko Sone 8-3 and, in a hard-fought, double-hill battle, Kelly Fisher.
Fisher and Ouschan advanced to the quarterfinals, both by shutout over McIntosh and Hopkins, respectively. Ouschan defeated Allison Fisher 8-5 in those quarterfinals before being eliminated by Wei in the semifinals 8-5.
The final match between Wei and Hung was a single race to 10. A hoped-for battle royale did not emerge. Wei got out in front relatively early and in the end, allowed Hung only four racks before she claimed the Dr. Pool Classic II title.
WPBA tour representatives thanked the ownership and staff at the Central Wisconsin Expo Center, as well as all of the 77 participants at the event. The Dr. Pool Classic was the last WPBA event of the year.The next scheduled event, “pending signed contract,” will be an event of the CSI Predator Pro Billiard Series, scheduled for Feb. 28-March 4, 2023 in Las Vegas, NV.
Alex Kazakis, Ko Ping Han and Chang Yu-Lung were among the big names knocked out of the Medalla Light Puerto Rico Open on the second day of play at the Puerto Rico Convention Center, San Juan, while the likes of Kelly Fisher, Margaret Fefilova and Chia Hua Chen are already into the last 16 of the Women’s event.
A goliath match up between Ko Pin-Yi and Alex Kazakis would usually be reserved for the closing stages of any tournament, but here it was a match in the second round on the losers’ side of the draw. Ko had been beaten by Denis Grabe on the opening day but a 4-1, 4-0 win over another Estonian, Gert Gnadeberg, got the two-time World Champion up and running.
A shootout defeat to Jonas Souto Comino in the first winners’ round earlier in the day had sent Kazakis to the one-loss side and, like Ko, he now needed three wins to qualify for the straight-knockout last 32.
Ko looked certain to take the first set 4-1 but missed a straight 3 by going rail first in attempt to gain position on the 4. However, another chance presented itself and was taken in the sixth rack as Ko took the set 4-2.
The first two racks of set two were shared and it was Kazakis who had a clear opening in the third, only to miss the 1 to the side when a simple 2/10 was waiting. Ko took the gift but Kazakis was level again at 2-2 one rack later. The Greek was then able to lead for the first time when Ko missed the 9, but the Taiwanese leveled at 3-3 to move a rack away from victory.
Kazakis needed to hope for a chance as Ko broke on the hill, and he got one immediately as Ko struggled to find power with his break, leaving Kazakis a layout from which he took a clear path to the shootout.
In the tie break, neither player so much as clipped a jaw in their four regulation innings, forcing sudden death where it was Kazakis who blinked first. Ko had already taken a 5-4 shootout lead when the Greek missed his fifth shot to be eliminated from the tournament. Ko’s next opponent will be Tyler Styer.
However, Ko’s brother Ping Han is out of the event after suffering a shootout defeat to Puerto Rico’s Miguel Batista. The home player took the first set 4-3 before Ko fired back, only to lose 3-2 in the shootout. Another local favorite, USA’s Puerto Rico-born Tony Robles, awaits Batista in the next round.
With $100,000 in the prize pot of the 128-player Open, and $75,000 for the 64-player Women’s event, the Medalla Light Puerto Rico Open is the final stop of the 2022 Predator Pro Billiard Series and will be followed in Puerto Rico by the Predator World Junior 9-Ball Championships and Predator World 8-Ball Championship.
In the Women’s Open, eight of the last 16 are now known. Kelly Fisher defeated Kristina Tkach by shootout to reach the single-elimination stage, while Canada Open champion ‘Amber’ Chen was winner over Japan’s Yuki Hiraguchi. Pia Filler, Allison Fisher and Margaret Fefilova make it four Europeans already through.
The other four players to reach the last 16 undefeated are all from Asia, with Filipino speed-shooter Chezka Centeno and Chinese Taipei’s Wang Wan-Ling and Tzu-Chien Wei joining compatriot Chen in the last 16 draw.
The Open event moves to single elimination with 32 players remaining. Winners’ qualification matches commence at 10am local time with Fedor Gorst, Carlo Biado and Francisco Sanchez-Ruiz among those with two chances to qualify. Wiktor Zielinski, Roberto Gomez and Yukio Akagariyama are some of the experienced players who will have to win two matches on the losers’ side of the draw if they are to make it.
Yep, Yapp won ‘em both. And his girlfriend, Silviana Lu won the other one.
The 3rd Annual Meucci Classic at Racks Billiards Sports Bar & Grill in Sanford, FL this past weekend (Nov. 10-13) gave Singapore’s Aloysius Yapp his third and fourth 2022 event victory, which added to his already-best (recorded with us) earnings year since we recorded his first two cash winnings in September of 2012, a week apart; a 17th place finish at the Party Poker World Cup of Pool in Quezon City in the Philippines (won by Mika Immonen) and a week+ later, a 33rd place finish at the China Open in Shanghai (won by Dennis Orcollo).
So, the Meucci Classic was nowhere near his first rodeo. By the same token, Yapp’s presence outside of a fairly consistent group of world-travelling pool professionals had him flying under a lot of the US pool-playing radar until he showed up in the finals of the 2021 US Open 9-Ball Championships in Atlantic City and battled in the finals (unsuccessfully) against Carlo Biado. He became a much more consistently-present figure for the rest of the year, with appearances in (among others) the American 14:1 Straight Pool Championships (9th), the International 9-Ball Open (17th), the International Open’s Big Foot 10-Ball (3rd behind Joshua Filler and Mika Immonen) and a win on the Predator US Pro Billiard Series in Battle Creek, Michigan.
He’s cashed in 19 events this year, winning four of them, runner-up in two and 3rd in three. He won this year’s Michigan Open and the Sandcastle Open before heading to the eastern shores of Virginia where he finished 9th at this year’s International Open 9-Ball tournament and was 3rd for the second time at the Big Foot 10-Ball event; this time, behind the juggernaut known as Fedor Gorst and Joshua Filler. He shuffled off to Sanford, FL last weekend, where he went undefeated through seven opponents, downing Austria’s Max Lechner twice; double hill in the hot seat match and 9-5 in the finals of the $4,000-added, 121-entrant 9-Ball tournament.
Left in the good-company dust (among others) were Austria’s Wiktor Zielinski, Poland’s Mieszko Fortunski, Germany’s Moritz Neuhausen, Finland’s Mika Immonen, Austria’s Mario He, Greece’s Alex Kazakis and Estonia’s Denis Grabe. Lithuania’s Pijus Labutis finished the tournament with the distinction of having won the most consecutive matches, 10 of them on the loss side, before he was stopped by Lechner in the semifinals. Leading the American charge for the title was BJ Ussery, Jr., who finished 4th; an outstanding finish for the South/mid-Atlantic competitor. Also in the US lineup were local stalwarts Anthony Meglino, Donny Mills, Mike Delawder, Raymond Linares, Bobby Garza and 1992’s US Open 9-Ball Champion, Tommy Kennedy.
The 3rd Annual Meucci Classic’s $5,000-added, 63-entrant 10-Ball Tournament was a different story. Same ending, just a different story. The 10-Ball battles preceded and overlapped the 9-Ball battles, so Yapp availed himself of the six-opponent practice opportunity, with an extra ball in the game, and went undefeated. He got by Poland’s Konrad Juszczyszyn and two Americans, George Saunders and Alan Rolon Rosado, to advance to the 16-player, single-elimination phase of the event. Yapp was joined in the winners’ side advancement by Wiktor Zielinski, Bosnia/Herzegovina’s Sanjin Pehlivanovich, Dmitri Loukatos, Taipei’s Jung Lin Chan and Jeffrey DeLuna. BJ Ussery, Jr., who’d go on to finish fourth in the 9-Ball competition, advanced, as did Donny Mills. Joining them from the loss side were Adam Wheeler, Max Lechner, Pijus Labutis (who would not get the most consecutive win prize in this event), Jani Uski, Mika Immonen, Mario He, David Singleton and Denis Grabe.
Ussery would engage in the only double hill battle of the single-elimination’s first round, against Jani Uski, and it would knock him out of the 10-Ball competition. Three of the four quarterfinal matches went double hill; Immonen over Uski, Yapp over Labutis, and Grabe over Lechner. Zielinski downed Pehlivanovic 11-5.
Zielinski ‘iced’ the Iceman, allowing him only a single rack in one of the semifinal matches, while Yapp was a little busier, eliminating Grabe 11-7. Yapp claimed the 10-Ball title with a stingy 11-3 victory over Zielinski.
Indonesia’s Silviana Lu goes undefeated, winning 81% of her 37 games to claim Ladies title
In this, her first year as a cash-winning player in our AZBilliards database, Indonesia’s Silviana Lu has cashed in only two events. She finished in a tie for 5th place at the Asian Pool Federation’s 9-Ball Open, Women’s Division in August. A month later, she finished in the tie for 9th place at the WPBA’s Michigan Open. Her boyfriend, Singapore’s Aloysius Yapp finished in the tie for 17th in the former event and won the latter.
She has recorded her first event victory with us as a result of going undefeated through a field of 27 entrants in the $1,000-added Ladies 9-Ball event. And she did so by defeating her six opponents with an 81% game-winning average (30-7), shutting out half of them and not allowing any of them to chalk up more than three against her; Nicolle Cuellar, who has Florida-area tour victories and cash finishes going back 10 years to the former Flamingo Tour.
Note to competitors looking to take advantage of the increased amount of money being offered at Scotch Doubles events across the country: In addition to the Fillers (Joshua and Pia) and the Fedor Gorst/Kristina Tkach pairing, you might want to watch out for the Yapp/Lu partnership.
Lu’s trip to the winners’ circle went through Marge Soash (0), Cuellar (3), Palmoa Santana (1) and Jessica Human (1) to arrive at the hot seat match versus Jennifer Berzinski to whom she gave up two racks to claim the seat. Adriana Villar, who lost her opening match to Cuellar and won eight on the loss side (shutting out three and surviving a double hill match against Helene Caukin), challenged Lu in the finals. Lu shut her out to claim the event title.
In addition to the 218 participants in the three events (with some duplication), tour representatives thanked title sponsor Meucci Cues, the ownership and staff at Rack’s for their hospitality, Outsville, JB Cases, Carlos Sanchez productions, Fort Worth Billiards Superstore and Clutch Shot Billiards Apparel.
Four-time Predator Pro Billiard Series champion Kelly Fisher had to come from 3-2 down to eventually win the second set against 12-year-old American Savannah Easton and move to the winners’ qualification stage of the Medalla Light Puerto Rico Open.
At the impressively set-up Puerto Rico Convention Center in San Juan, 192 pro players from 44 countries opened the 2022 Caribbean CueSports International Expo on Tuesday. With $100,000 in the prize pot of the 128-player Open, and $75,000 for the 64-player Women’s event, the Medalla Light Puerto Rico Open is the final stop of the 2022 Predator Pro Billiard Series and will be followed in Puerto Rico by the Predator World Junior 9-Ball Championships and Predator World 8-Ball Championship.
After beating Elise Qiu on a shootout at the start of the day, Fisher faced Easton on the TV table in her hunt for an unprecedented fifth Predator Pro Billiard Series title. Easton has been making waves this year, most recently taking fifth in the WPBA’s Sledgehammer Open in Bristol, TN last month.
The 12-year-old had seen off Emilyn Callado in straight sets in the opening round and earned a huge ovation from the Puerto Rican crowd for her efforts against Fisher, who was almost taken to shootout by the youngster nicknamed ‘Roadrunner’.
Having won the first set 4-2, Fisher took a 2-0 lead in the second. However, the American youngster, who will take part in the Predator World Junior 9-Ball Championships starting Friday, cut that lead in half after making the 5 with the bridge. Easton then leveled the set at 2-2 after a safety battle with just the 9 and 10 remaining and a long 8 opened up the fifth game of the set for the junior, who took a 3-2 lead.
A dry break from the hill allowed Fisher to play a safety which Easton couldn’t escape but ball in hand was returned by the Brit when she completely missed the 7. However, Easton left a long 9 in the jaw and Fisher was finally level again at hill-hill in the second set.
The final rack brought more drama as Easton battled for the shootout but the pressure showed as she overcut the 10. Both players had another chance to close out the set but it was Fisher who got over the line to advance to winners qualification tomorrow.
“What a great player, she has nerves of steel and definitely one to watch for the future,” said Fisher. “She should have had me there, it should have been a shootout. I was all over the place but she missed some crucial balls at the end.
“What a great future she knows she must have, she is a great player and we are going to see her in the future. I, personally, don’t want to play her again; she put me under pressure, she got me, could have had me, and I don’t want to play her again until she’s 18!”
“I was this close, I was so close,” said Easton. “In the first set when I was 2-2 I thought I might be able to beat her, and in the second set when it was 3-2 and I took that break, I was so excited but I tried to hold it in as much as I could. It was so fun, I couldn’t believe it.”
In the men’s tournament, local favorite Alan Rolon was well-supported as he Wu Kun Lin by shootout and then Alex Montpellier to earn a day off and set up a winners’ qualification match against Badar Alawadhi on Thursday morning.
A strong field spelt early casualties as the likes of Ko Ping-Han, Aloysius Yapp and Ko Pin-Yi all lost in the first round and now face a long road to reach the last 32 and single elimination.
