So after a long year of playing pool on Wednesday nights we descended on Tailgators last Friday evening for the start of our year end Pool Tournament. We have been doing this now for a few years and have come away with money each time, though every team receives some money. I wouldn't say we are the best or the worst players in the league but we can have our on days and off days like any team. The tournament is played in a double elimination format, meaning that once you loose two games you are eliminated. Here is our year stats.
Friday Night
We were going into the tournament sitting in sixth place out of eighteen teams and our first opponent was Honk on Bobo who were placed in eleventh but their players had an overall better handicap than us. All 16 games were very close and it was down to the last four games. On my last game, on my first shot just as the game started, I made a risky shot that even the opponent stated they would not take. I was making a long shot at the one in the corner right next to where the eight laid. I took the shot, missed and hit the eight sending it towards towards the corner pocket where it bounced around a bit and came to a stop on the edge of the pocket before dropping in. Wow that was a close one and I now have to watch out for that pocket for the rest of the game. My opponent stepped up to make his first shot, which he made, but the cue ball continued to bounce around the table striking the eight and dropping it giving me the win in that game 10-3. The rest of the final games continued and we beat Honk on Bobo by just 4 points overall. I don't want to take credit for those four points, but if I didn't take that risky shot we would have lost. By the end of the weekend this was known as the TSN turning point of the weekend and Honk on Bobo would be our most difficult matches of the weekend outside of the finals.Saturday
Saturday morning we were back at Tailgators at ten am to take on the third place team 3 Sticks and a Rack on the "A" side of the tournament. Everyone on both teams were a little hungover from the play the night before holding their Tim Horton coffee's, wondering how the day would unfold. On our side we were expecting our first defeat of the weekend and being relegated to the "B" side of the pool knowing this team has beaten us all times through the year even EROing (10-0 wins) most of us (I've only had one against me and it was from this team). All this while scenes of candy canes danced in their heads knowing it was going to be a easy win for them like my guarantee of getting a apple and orange in my stocking at Christmas. But has we know now they got nothing but a big lump of coal, at the beginning of the fourth set they conceded to a lost since their was no way for them to gain back the points in 3 games to beat us. Well holy crap the Chalk Rings are 2-0 and still in the "A" pool. We were now off for a few hours and were not due back to the pool hall until 7 pm for our next match.Our match at 7pm on Saturday we were taking on FELT. FELT finished on seventh place just below us in the standings. FELT is a father and son duo with two others. They have been coming up the ranks for the past couple of years and seem to have different extra players on the team each year. We felt going into these matches that we were capable of beating them but we would have to be on our game. Through the 16 games we were called multiple times by them accusing us of not calling shots or making fouls. But if they don't call a ref prior to the shot being made than no foul can be committed. Again we stayed to our main game plan to sink balls first, win the game second and it proved to work. Heading into the 13 game they admitted defeat since we were up too many balls for them to come back to win.
Having won 3 of our matches and still being on the "A" side of the tournament we were starting to wonder what was in store for our 10pm match up. Clearly there can only be a mighty team left for us to compete against knowing the winner would be in the finals on Sunday and the loser would be dropped to the "B" pool. Lo and behold the next team for us to compete against was Rack and Roll a team that finished in first place over with some very mighty stats. This also the same team who should not even be competing in this league. The max handicap for a team in the league is 28 and with their players they stood at 30. This was going to be the David vs. Goliath match up of the weekend and maybe the year. Going into the 16 games they were giving us a mammoth 28 points before we even started due to the handicap difference. These 16 games we would play on two tables and it was great to watch and play next to each other. After the first four games, we had won 3 of 4 and were up about 40 points on them. By the start of the third game in the third round we had won 8 or 11 and were up over 65 points on them, at that point they folded, we had defeated the top league team and were headed to the finals on Sunday. For the next hour we had drinks and were in awe of how we made it this far. Now tomorrow we would be back for the finals and what made it better was knowing that who ever we took on, had to beat us twice but we only had to beat them once because of the double elimination.
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| Tournament ladder showing us in the finals |
Sunday
Here we are again, back at Tailgators on Sunday. We showed up at 3 today, with our finals starting at 4pm. There is still no decided winner in the "B" pool, so we don't know yet who we will be facing but there is a good chance that it will be Rack and Roll the first place team from last night. Sure enough Rack and Roll would be moved back into the "A" pool and we would have to play them again but not once but twice. We got started our first matches at about 5pm and they came to the table a different team, with their foot on the gas and not letting off. They took the first set of 16 handily so we would now have to play in the second set for all the gusto, who ever wins this wins it all. We went back to our game plan of sink balls first and try to win second. This ended up not helping, we were not on our game and they were having awesome games. It came down to the second last game before they won it so I think we gave them a run for their $4000, but we just couldn't do it. We came in second overall for the weekend and won $2000, so not to shabby for the team that could. Pool is now done for the year except for the end of year banquet where we will receive our trophies. It was a great year and tournament overall and I did not expect to make it that far. A wonderful showing by the Chalk Rings: Andrew Boyle, Danielle Boyle*, Justin Clouthier and myself. *Richard Steeves subbed in for Danielle from February till the end including the tournament since Danielle had a baby. Take a look at the pictures below. |
| Justin, Andrew, Me and Richard |
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| Me, Richard, Andrew and Justin |
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