IPT World Open Preview: Talented Tots Wu and Ouschan to Debut
The big news in the first round of the International Pool Tour’s latest multi-million dollar 8-ball tournament will be the debuts of young superstars Chia-Ching Wu of Taiwan and Jasmin Ouschan of Austria, both looking for a big piece of the record-setting $3 million purse.
The eight-day 8-ball event — with a precedent-setting $500,000 first-place prize — kicks off Sunday, Sept. 3, at the Grand Sierra Resort and Casino in Reno, Nev.
Both 17-year-old Wu and 20-year-old Ouschan earned entry into the tournament through the IPT’s rugged qualifier process, and they’re expected to go deep. The precocious Wu is the current WPA world 9-ball and 8-ball champion, and Ouschan topped the star-studded field at the EnjoyPool.com 9-Ball Championship in May.
Otherwise, it looks like smooth sailing for most of the favorites in the first round of the International Pool Tour’s World 8-Ball Open Championship, as the just-released groupings reveal predominantly balanced matchups for the first two days of the event. Top-ranked players were seeded in the field.
Of course, a few players had cause for muttering under their breaths when the groups were announced early Friday. Of the best-known players, Hall-of-Famers and best buddies Ewa Laurance and Loree Jon Jones appear to have their work cut out for them. For that matter, the groupings did no favors for Ouschan, the only female player to have won a spot in an IPT field through the qualifier process.
Expect some surprises. As the players learned in the IPT’s first event of the 2006 season — the North American Open 8-Ball Championship in July — there are dozens of unheralded 8-ball whizzes out there waiting for their big shot, and the 200-player World field features 50 qualifiers who have already proved their mettle.
Look for surprising runs from several Asian qualifiers who now have their feet in the IPT’s door, including Wu from Taiwan (who was seeded 16th in the absence of Filipino Rodolfo Luat), and his countryman Hui-Kai Hsia, a two-time world juniors champion.
The first round will feature 40 groups of five players each. After round-robin play, the top three finishers in each group will proceed to the second round. Eliminated players from the first round will each receive a whopping $5,000.
The complete list of groupings is available at the IPT Web site: www.internationalpooltour.com.
Here are some of the more intriguing brackets from the first round:
Bracket 23 — BD Bloodbath Special: Spectators looking for an exciting bracket to follow should check out this group. No superstars, just tough and hungry veterans: Ivica Putnik (Croatia), Thomas Engert (Germany), Tony Chohan (USA), Tony Drago (Malta), and Zlatko Jakulj (Croatia)
Bracket 1: German sensation Thorsten Hohmann received the top seed by virtue of his $350,000 win at the North American Open, joined here by talented American Steve Moore, Filipino toughie Warren Kiamco, and Americans Jim Raney and Loree Jon Jones. Jones, who survived the first round at the North American Open, will have to bring her “A” game here.
Bracket 26: Austria’s Jasmin Ouschan must contend with Hall-of-Famer Earl Strickland, Swedish veteran Tom Storm, Aruba national champion Roland Acosta and American Pete Fusco. Ouschan regularly hones her skills against the best male players in Europe, so don’t expect her to be intimidated by Strickland, or anyone else in the field, for that matter,
Bracket 18: Hall-of-Famer Ewa Laurance will have her hands full with Australia’s Quinten Hann, the snooker bad boy who finished a surprising 18th at the North American Open; snooker ace Ronnie O’Sullivan from the U.K.; and Jeremy Jones (USA) and Jose Parica (Philippines), both experienced champions who met untimely exits at the North American Open. This bracket will be a dog fight.
Bracket 35: Future Hall-of-Famer Allison Fisher, who was undefeated in the first round of the North American Open, once again has a clean look at the second round. But watch out for qualifier Hui-Kai Hsia of Taiwan and surprising Frenchman Yannick Beaufils. Tough Americans Teddy Garrahan and John Ditoro round out the group, and neither will play patsy.
Bracket 10: Once again, 13-year-old Austin Murphy has a good shot at leaving the first round, this time sharing a bracket with 10th-ranked Darren Appleton (U.K.), Paul Potier (Canada), George San Souci (USA) and Ouahbi Amine (Morocco). Murphy missed the second round at the North American Open by a single rack, losing an 8-7 nailbiter to Danny Basavich. Let’s go, Austin.
Hallelujah: Winners Sing Out as IPT Field Narrows, Grows Richer
Jubilant shouts and the deep thud of cue butts slamming the floor echoed through the Venetian Hotel and Casino on Thursday night as 18 pool players took another step closer to the $350,000 top prize at the $2 million IPT North American 8-Ball Open – and another 18 saw their dreams cut short.
“Haalllloooooooo!” cried Efren Reyes, as he sank the winning 8 in a must-win hill-hill match against Mick Hill of the U.K., and pumped his fists to the ceiling. He punctuated his triumphant shout with a relieved chuckle, as he watched the cue ball come an inch from scratching in the corner.
“YES!” shouted Englishman Darren Appleton, upon hearing that bracket imate Cory Deuel had lost his last match of the day, leaving the door open for his own ascension into the next round.
“Thank you! Thank you! See you tomorrow, everybody! Yiiiii yiiiiiii!” shrieked Ronato Alcano of the Philippines, after his stats were posted on the official scoreboard and he saw that he beat America Dee Adkins for the third sport in his bracket by a percentage point.
After a 12-hour day of round-robin play, the field of 36 players in round four winnowed to 18, who were guaranteed $30,000 each by virtue of advancing to the fifth round of play. Their 18 eliminated compatriots pocketed a none-too-shabby $17,000.
The Filipino contingent continued its dominance and bettered it chances for claiming the championship, placing seven players in the last 18: Reyes, Alcano, Francisco Bustamante, Marlon Manalo, Dennis Orcollo, Alex Pagulayan and Rodolpho Luat.
The U.S. placed three players in the fifth round with Gabe Owen, Larry Nevel and David Matlock. The U.K. is two strong with Appleton and Daryl Peach. Germany’s last two hopes were Thorsten Hohmann and Ralf Souquet. The remaining four players were Evgeny Stalev of Russia, Australia’s Quentin Hann, and Sweden’s Marcus Chamat, and Rico Diks, representing the Netherlands
As the clock rounded 8 p.m., it was gut-check time for several players who had recorded records of 2-2 and needed a win in their final match for a shot at advancing. Players took their turns in front of the tournament’s billboard-sized scoreboard, nervously drawing numbers in the air as they tried to figure out the calculus of the bracket and how they would fare in different scenarios.
Players on the bubble with 2-2 records included Reyes, matched against Hill (1-3); Alex Pagulayan, playing against fellow Filipino Dennis Orcollo (3-1); and Deuel, set against Filipino Marlon Manalo (3-1). Matches that paired players with identical 2-2 records included Frenchman Yannick Beaufils vs. Niels Feijen of the Netherlands; American Earl Strickland vs. Alcano; and Francisco Bustamante vs. Santos Sambajon, both of the Philippines.
American Gabe Owen was stuck in a must-win position from the third match of the day. He faced fearsome Filipinos Bustamante and Sambajon in his first two matches and lost both of them. He needed to win the next three matches to have a hope of advancing.
“I just thought, screw it – just let it go. You only live once, just do it,” Owen said.
He proceeded to beat Reyes, 8-6; then Hill, 8-6; and in the longest match of the fifth set, Ivica Putnik of Croatia, 8-5. Sinking the last 8, he yelled and pumped his fist at jackhammer speed.
“My feet are killing me,” he said afterwards.
One of three Americans left in the field, Owen felt he had a shot at the title. “I feel like 8-ball is my best game, and I’m getting underrated here,” he said. “I’ve been practicing nothing but my 8-ball break for the last six months. Even in 9-ball tournaments, I’ve been breaking from the box. Screw $5,000 for winning a 9-ball tournament when you can win on the IPT.”
Stalev of Russia already knew what he would do with the $350,000. “I promised my friend [IPT member] Fabio Petroni that we would go on a vacation to Hawaii with five girls,” he said.
Stalev was one of the few players whose record was strong enough by early evening to count on advancing. Others were not as lucky.
“The pressure … the pressure … the hunger … I’m so tired,” said the rail-thin Alcano after squeaking by Strickland, 8-7, in their 8 p.m. match. He tossed his cue in the air, caught it and then did a stiff jig as Strickland packed up his cue case and ignored repeated requests for an on-camera interview by IPT staff.
Even countryman Reyes, perhaps the best big-money player in history, felt the pressure and dogged several shots in his 8-7 win against Hill. He often appeared listless and confused, and several observers opined that the rugged, five-match-a-day schedule was getting to the 51-year-old Hall of Famer.
“I don’t feel tired, … I feel the pressure because I’m in danger,” he said. “My opponent played good. Every time he got a shot, he ran out. In the last game, it was too much pressure for me. I didn’t know what to do in the last game. That’s why I was just shoot, shoot, shoot.”
IPT Round Three Complete
LAS VEGAS, Nev. – Despite some strong opposition from European players, including the surprising contingent of English 8-ballers, the always tough Filipinos are dominating the history-making IPT North American 8-Ball Open.
Virtually every Filipino competitor who started in the 200-player field has made it through to the 36-man fourth round of play – nine altogether, including three Pinoy hopefuls who needed to win qualifiers to gain entry to the $2 million tournament.
Leading the pack, as usual, was legendary Efren “Bata” Reyes, whose overall record stood at 12-1 after three days of round-robin play. No less impressive was the ball-control mastery of Filipino Marlon Manalo, who held an identical 12-1 record, along with Germany’s Ralf Souquet and Rafael Martinez of Mexico.
Third-round play began on Wednesday at the Venetian Hotel and Casino with the remaining 60 players divied into 12 groups of five. The top three in each group would advance to the fourth round on Thursday with a guarantee of at least $17,000 in prize money; the eliminated players would collect a still-impressive $10,000 each.
By 9:45 p.m., the lucky 36 were known. Their names follow, grouped by country, with their third-round records:
USA: Dee Adkins, 4-0; Jason Kirkwood, 3-1; Earl Strickland, 3-1; Cory Deuel, 4-0; Shawn Putnam, 3-1; Rodney Morris, 3-1; Larry Nevel, 3-1; Gabe Owen, 2-2; and David Matlock, 2-2.
Philippines: Efren Reyes, 4-0; Marlon Manalo, 4-0; Francisco Bustamante, 2-2; Dennis Orcollo, 3-1; Antonio Lining, 4-0; Rodolfo Luat, 2-2; Alex Pagulayan, 3-1; Santos Sambajon, 2-2; and Ronato Alcano, 2-2.
United Kingdom: Rico Diks, 2-2; Raj Hundal, 1-3; Daryl Peach, 2-2; Darren Appleton, 2-2; Mick Hill, 3-1.
Netherlands: Niels Feijen, 3-1; Alex Lely, 3-1; and Nick Van den Berg, 3-1.
Germany: Ralf Souquet, 4-0; and Thorsten Hohmann, 3-1.
Other countries: Quinten Hann (Australia), 2-2; Ivica Putnik (Croatia), 2-2; Mika Immonen (Finland), 3-1; Sandor Tot (Italy), 2-2; Yannick Beaufils (France), 2-2; Rafael Martinez (Mexico), 4-0; Evgeny Stalev (Russia), 2-2; and Marcus Chamat (Sweden), 3-1.
Here are some highlights from the round:
* The biggest eye-opener for many established players at the Open has been the success of the top competitors on the English 8-ball circuit, including perennial champions Mick Hill and Darren Appleton. Both will compete in the round-of-36.
“Us lads have come to play the top players from around the world, and I feel that we haven’t been given a chance,” said 26-year-old Hill. “The point that us English lads want to get across to everyone, including our own back home, is that we’re playing 8-ball, not 9-ball or straight-pool. … A lot of people don’t realize that the English players play 8-ball.”
Among their strengths are excellent cue ball control and solid stroke mechanics, said observers.
“Those guys shoot very straight, and I can respect that,” said IPT member Ike Runnels.
* Fifteen women started the competition on Sunday, and only former snooker stars Allison Fisher and Karen Corr were given much of a chance to advance. One woman was able to infiltrate the third round, and she was a U.K. native, but no one you might expect.
“I sort of in a way proved a point,” said Sarah Ellerby, who collected dozens of 8-ball titles in England before coming to the U.S. to compete on the WPBA Classic Tour. “…There wasn’t as much attention on me as on the other girls, and that’s fine.
“I’m sure that some of the guys were like, ‘The women won’t do well here,’” Ellerby said. “If I could break better, I feel like I could really make more of a dent. I think the women are capable enough to come here and do well.”
Unfortunately, Ellerby fell into a tough bracket in the third round and finished with a 1-3 record. Knowing she wouldn’t advance, Ellerby immediately left for the Las Vegas airport to catch an 11:30 p.m. United Airlines flight to Chicago. There, she would catch a limo for a two-hour drive to Peoria, the site of the WPBA Midwest Classic, which was starting play Thursday morning.
“I’m going to be very tired,” she said.
* Staying on the English for another moment, sharp observers might note that Raj Hundal advanced with a 1-3 record. It’s no misprint. Hundal was in a bracket with players who posted 4-0 and 3-1 records (Reyes and Strickland), leaving the other three players with 1-3 tallies. Of the three, Hundal had the highest games-won percentage (56.49 percent, just over American Gary Abood’s 55.09 percent), which pushed him into the next round. That 1.4 percent difference was worth at least $7,000.
“I’m in! I’m in!” the burly Hundal screamed upon hearing the results. “I’m freewheeling tomorrow! … I’m the luckiest [expletive] in the world!”
* Another surprise at the end of the day was how many players who were forced to qualify for the event ended up in the round-of-36. The 200-player field offered 50 qualifiers, and no fewer than nine made it into the fourth round. They included Filipinos Luat, Sambajon and Alcano.
* Most of the favorites remained in the running for the fourth round, with one major exception. American Johnny Archer faded in his bracket, finishing with a 1-3 record.