BJ Ussery earned his first ever Viking Cue 9-Ball Tour victory this weekend and he picked a good place and time to do it at the Regional Championship held at GameTime / Riptide in Greenville, SC.
The field of 55 players had a few top guns who were not regulars at Viking Tour events. Grady Mathews and Tommy Kennedy were just two of those players. Mathews defeated Shawn Putnam 9-4 after Putnam just barely fouled on a jump-shot while leading 4-0. The call was close, but went against Putnam and he was unable to win a game after that. Mathews lost to Kennedy 9-4 in a great match later in the tournament.
Ussery made his way through the field to play Lynny Samonsky for the hot-seat. Ussery came up short in this match, and took the trip to the B-Side to face Tommy Kennedy. Ussery is a regular on Kennedy's SE Open 9-Ball tour and he sent Tommy to the bleachers with a third place finish.
In the rematch with Samonsky, Ussery took control early and rolled to a 9-2 win in the first set. The second set was closer, but had the same result as Ussery won 9-5 to earn first place.
Ussery won $2870 for first, while Samonsky pocketed $1750 for second. Kennedy and Richey Samonsky filled out the top four positions.
The Viking Cue 9-Ball Tour will be at Quentin Corner Pocket in Palatine, IL next weekend for another $5000 added regional championship. They will also have a $1000 added event at Kennedy's Broadway Billiards in Lorain, Ohio next weekend. This event will be the first of four events in Ohio in the month of November with a total of over $30,000 in added money.
Complete Payouts:
1st BJ Ussery $2870
2nd Lynny Samonsky $1750
3rd Tommy Kennedy $1150
4th Richey Samonsky $850
5th/6th Tony Miller, Grady Mathews $500
7th/8th Scott Raybon, Jeff Abernethy $345
9th/12th Stevie Moore, Jerry Grooms, Ron Park, Tony Watson $180
13th/16th Jeff Clarke, Wayne Butler, Randy Canipe, Eddie Little $100
