After three days of play at The Billiard House in Modesto, California, the initial field of sixty one players has been whittled down to just eight at the 2024 United States Billiard Association National Championship.
The original field of players competed in eight round robin groups of seven or eight players in twenty five point matches with the top three players from each group advancing.
The final twenty four players got started on Saturday in a single elimination bracket that awarded byes to the top eight players from the group stages. After one round of players was eliminated, the final sixteen players all competed and the first three top group seeds eliminated with Carlos Mario Villegas defeating Young Ha Choi 40-27 and Jim Semerci beating Quoc Thinh Le 40-35 in 44 innings. Raymon Groot also lost to Sang Ho Kim 40-37 in 47 innings.
Play got underway on Sunday with the final eight players, who will play down to one winner today.
The USBA field for the Las Vegas World Cup is rounding out. The USBA has selected Mazin Shooni, Frank Torres and Raymon Groot to participate in the tournament. With their selection, ten spots remain for USBA players. These will be determined on March 25 and 26 at two qualifying tournaments to be held in Las Vegas prior to the start of the World Cup.
Three players selected by USBA
Shooni and Torres are past USBA national champions. Groot finished second in the 2020 USBA national tournament. All three have extensive international playing experience, with Torres’ second place finish in the 1987 World Championship being the most-notable highlight. They join nine other USBA players who have been selected to play in the tournament.
Two players have been selected by Predator, the host organizer for the World Cup, as its wildcards: Pedro Piedrabuena and Hugo Patiño. Piedrabuena finished first in the 2021 USBA national tournament. Patiño is a four-time USBA national champion. The USBA had previously selected the following players based on their top-eight placement in the 2021 National tournament: Tae Kyu Lee, Young Kyu Lee, Edward Gomez, John Park, Miguel Torres, Kang Lee, and Eric Kwon.
The Las Vegas World Cup, scheduled from March 27 to April 2, 2022 at the Rio All-Suite Hotel & Casino, is one of eight similar tournaments on the UMB calendar for 2022. Each tournament is limited to 149 players.
The Silver Cup in Huntington Park was captured by Pedro Piedrabuena. He beat his eternal rival Hugo Patino in a one-sided final: 35-15 in 18, to defend his 2019 title.
We should not assume that Pedro always wins. Hugo has four national titles, and he has beaten Pedro many times. But it is the quiet man from Montevideo, now San Diego, who has the much better all-year general average, the precision, the temperament. And nine national USA titles, let’s not forget. Pedro is the strongest 3-cushion player on the continent, has been ever since he took over from the legendary Sang Chun Lee, and he’s not about to step down.
Ricky Carranco and Raymon Groot were the losing semifinalists, Groot eventually winning the play-off for 3d place. The Dutchie booked a character win over the very dangerous Harry Pena in the quarters. Pena did play the best match of the tournament: 35 in 12. Groot left some chances unused against Piedrabuena, Carranco, tournament director as well as player, found his Waterloo against Patino.
It was remarkable to see how many matches went to the wire, or “hill-hill” as the pool players would say. Even though handicaps were used (35 – 32 – 29 – 27 – 25 – 22), all the strongest players survived the group stage to create a high-quality final day. If anything was obvious, it was that players as well as spectators had been dying for this kind of action in the past year and a half.
The tournament was partly in honor of the recently deceased Luis Avila from Mexico, a top player who often participated in events on US soil. Kudos to Vicke Pineda, Hector Ocampo, Ricky Carranco, POV Pool and others to make a 72-player event possible.
The Vietnamese Contingent
Gilbert Najm
Kevin Pham
Abram Díaz / Cue Repair
Raymond Groot
Ricky Carranco
Hugo Patino
Carlos Cruz
Paul Feltman Jr. and Mazin Shooni
Hugo Patino
Hugo Patino vs Ricky Carranco / 3rd place match
Ricky Carranco / 4th place / Tournament Director
Young Gull Lee
Paul Feltman Jr. and Mazin Shooni
Terry Park and Javier Vera
Guillermo Sosa
Vicke Pineda and Paul Feltman Jr
Gilbert Najm & Hector Ocampo with Geraldine Thibodeau / POVPOOL
Raymond Groot
Ricardo Carranco Sr.
Pedro Piedrabuena
Kevin Pham
Hugo Patino, Hector Ocampo, Vicke Pineda and Ricky Carranco
