Here is a breakdown of the City Championships for us. We lost our match Friday night, ( I won my match here) but luckily this is a modified double elimination tournament, meaning you are guaranteed to play at least two matches. After that, even if you've won your first two you will be sent home if you lose. So we had one more chance to stay alive on Sat. afternoon. I missed our 2 p.m. match because of work, but we managed to eke out a victory. Our next match was at 7 p.m.
The format is like this: You can play up to 5 people on your team. Each player is handicapped with a skill level; 3 being the lowest(for males) and 7 being the highest. But, your team is only allowed to play up to 23 skill level (SL) points during the match. Now in a tournament the team that wins 3 out of 5 indivdual matches first moves on to the next round. Both of our previous matches came down to the fifth match, and both of those went "double hill" which means whoever wins that final single game moves on. We quickly beat up this opponent 3-0. Sweet, we'll be home by 10:00, get a good night's sleep and be back at 9:00 a.m. to kick some ass.
Sunday was completely different. We need to win 3 more times to get to Vegas. I blew a chance to put us up 2-1 by scratching on the 8-ball in my first game against a SL3, putting her on the hill. But I didn't lose my cool. I was definitely playing better than this foe. My shot making has improved a lot in the past few months and I'm shaping the cue very well now. But, sadly to say, I screwed up on another 8-ball. We were playing on Ivan Simonis felt and it was WICKEDLY fast which will throw a ball out of the pocket if you hit too hard. Guess what I did? I hit too hard and rattled the pocket, leaving my foe an easy two ball run out. That, just like other things in life sometimes, is the way it goes.
Next match we put up our big gun, a SL 7. He gets a SL 6 so the race is 5-4. Our 7 must win 5 before the other guy gets to 4. I must add that he broke his elbow playing basketball 3-1/2 weeks ago and had a screw put in about 10 days before this tournament. To see him playing back at his best - and he was - in such a short time is remarkable The 6 wins the break and the first game is in his favor after 2 innings. We're down 1-0. Next game he makes the 8 on the break. Now our 7 is down 2-0 after 2 games, but manages to get to double hill by playing some killer defense, and wins the final game. We're all tied up, 2-2 with one match to come.
Both of our teams only have a SL 3 left to play. It's a race to 2. Our 3 has only been playing competitively for 3 months and he's shaking. I've been there myself. As a 3 on my first Vegas experience, I had to play the final match, but mine was "sudden death ". One game to decide who wins and mine was to get into the money. He's playing a female and she's not nervous at all. In fact, she runs 6 balls on her break in the first game and eventually wins the first game.
Our 3 comes back and does the same thing to her in the next game, but misses the 8-ball twice. If you've never been in this type of pressure situation it's grueling. Your team is living and dieing on every shot. Now, the other 3 is feeling it too. She starts shanking easy, strraight in shots so he redeems himself and ties up the score, 1-1. The next game decides our fate. It came down to the 8-ball, and our guy rattled the pocket. So, that was that. better luck next year.....
Let me end by saying this about the pool league. It's very hard to qualify for City. You have to play a 16 week schedule against 12 + teams and be in the top three to qualify for a playoff and win that to get into City. You get 3 chances to do this in a year. If you're lucky enough to qualify you are going against 80 other teams for 4 spots to go to Vegas. ( I stated 5 in my Previous post, and that was wrong) My personal record in City matches now stands at 8-1. I've been to City 5 times now, so I can't complain too much, but it hurts when you lose. To quote Roger Federer after his loss in the French Open this year, "The disappointment goes away pretty quickly." And it will. I am now a captain again and will build a team I think can win next year. Right now after 5 weeks we're in 2nd place, one point out of first. My motto is and always be "Win Three each week and the rest will take care of itself." Here's to next year...........
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