Original Tournament Announcement

The first stop of the 2007 USBA 3-Cushion Billiard Tour was held in Little Ferry, New Jersey at Royal Billiards, owned by Mr. Su Yee Kim.

A “split” format was used. Players who averaged over .800 were considered “A” players and anyone below .800 was considered a “B” player. In essence, there were 2 different tournaments going on simultaneously. The “A” tournament consisted of 10 players:
8 “A” players and 2 “B” players who opted to play along with the “A” players. The “B” tournament had 14 players. Six European tables with brand new Simonis cloth were used, along with brand new Aramith Pro-Cup balls which were generously donated by Aramith for the Tour. Two beautiful Schuler Cues valued at approximately $ 500.00 each were also generously donated by Schuler Cues for the raffle in order to generate money to support the Tour. The “A” players paid a $ 305.00 entry fee and the “B” players paid a
$ 155.00 entry fee. In addition, $ 2,500.00 was added to the “A” Group and $ 500.00 was added to the “B” Group by Royal Billiards’ owner Su Yee Kim and the USBA Tour Directors: Jim Shovak, Paul Frankel (Professor Q Ball), Mazin Shooni and Pedro Piedrabuena. Scorekeepers kept innings and points for every match in the tournament.

Needless to say, the experimental format proved to be a big success and all the players seemed to be very happy about it. Future split tournament formats are already in motion for the rest of the year.

Click on the Flight name to see Tournament charts.

The “A” Group featured such top players as: Mazin Shooni the 2006 US Champion, Sonny Cho the 2005 US Champion, Hugo Patino the 2003 US Champion, Miguel Torres the 2003 Runner-Up, Francisco Parra from Master Billiards, Young Gull Lee the 6th and 7th place finisher in the last two US Championships and Su Yee Kim: the owner of Royal Billiards and financial contributor to the tournament. Local players Yong Park, Soong Hyun Lee and Won Sik Kang also participated and played valiantly.

Early on, Miguel Torres hurt his chances of winning the tournament by losing to Young Gull Lee. For the first half of the tournament, it was Sonny Cho and Hugo Patino fighting for first place with no losses and Mazin Shooni and Miguel Torres behind with one loss each. At the end of 7 rounds with 2 rounds left to play, it was still anyone’s tournament.
Mazin Shooni and Sonny Cho each lost 2 games and by the time the last round came, it was between 2 players: Hugo Patino and Miguel Torres, both originally from Columbia, with 1 loss each.

In the last match, Miguel Torres rose to the occasion by averaging over 1.300 and won handily, 30-19. Miguel finished 8-1 with a grand average of 1.035, a best game of 2.000, and a high run of 10. Hugo finished 2nd, with a 7-2 record, the high tournament average of 1.260 and a high run of 10. Congratulations to Miguel Torres, winning $ 1,800.00 in prize money! Miguel also performed his famous, magical, trick-shot exhibition after the tournament was over and wowed the local crowd.

Hugo Patino-2nd Place "A"	Sonny Cho-3rd Place "A"
Mazin Shooni-4th Place "A"	Francisco Parra-5th Place "A"

The “B” Tournament consisted of 14 players who were split up into 2 flights of 7 players each. The flights were designated “B” and “C”, not because of the players’ ability, but because there were 2 flights that both needed to have a name. The “B” flight had 7 players, so everyone played 6 games each. The “C” flight originally had 7 players, but one local player had to leave on business, so each player only played 5 games each.

Among the favorites to win the entire “B” tournament were Jose Costa and Felipe Razon, who finished 11th and 12th respectively in the 2007 National Championship. The luck of the draw put both of these players in the “B” flight. The 2 top finishers in both the “B” flight and the “C” flight would advance to a 4-man final round.

Felipe Razon finished first in the “B” flight with a record of 5 and 1. However, the surprise of the flight was newcomer Edwar Gomez who also finished 5-1 and advanced to the finals over Jose Costa.

Jim Shovak went undefeated, 5-0 in the “C” flight and Charles Brown played extremely well going 4-1, the only loss being to Shovak.

B Finals: The 4 finalists now had to play each other to determine the Champion. Each player would play 3 games and if there was a tie, there would be a 10-point playoff game. In the very first round, there were two upsets: Charles Brown averaged .658 to defeat Felipe Razon 25-22 and Edwad Gomez averaged .694 to hand Jim Shovak his first loss of the tournament, 25-20. If Razon or Shovak lost another game, they would not be able to win the tournament.

In the second round, Felipe Razon fought back with a vengeance and averaged .694 to win handily against Gomez, 25-9. In the other match, Charles Brown was ahead mostly all of the game as Shovak could not seem to find a way to score. Finally, towards the end of the game, Shovak found his stroke and edged by Brown, 25-20, keeping his hopes alive.

Before the start of the third and final round, there was a very interesting scenario. All four players were 1-1, meaning that whichever 2 players won their matches would be tied for 1st place and would have to play a 10-point playoff to determine the Champion.

Charles Brown and Edwar Gomez went head-to-head, playing a very tense match. Both players were tied at 20 points apiece. The loser would end up in 3rd or 4th place. Charles Brown broke through, scoring 5 unanswered points to win the match, 25-20.

Jim Shovak had to face his toughest opponent of the tournament: the dangerous Felipe Razon who had the best game of the “B” tournament with an .893 average and the best grand average of .716. But Shovak chose to play his best match of the tournament at the perfect time, averaging .694 and winning comfortably, 25-17, knocking Razon from contention.

That left a 10-point playoff between Brown and Shovak to determine the winner. With the “A” Tournament already finished, the entire room watched the playoff match, anxiously anticipating the outcome (as well as the outcome of the raffle). Shovak took the lead 8-3 and Brown closed the gap to 8-7 before Shovak finally went out, winning the “B” Tournament Championship, 10-7. First prize was $ 1,000.00 and 2nd place was
$ 750.00. Both players agreed to split the prize money and play only for the title.

Charles Brown-2nd "B"

Felipe Razon-3rd "B"

Edwar Gomez-4th "B"

Afterwards, the awards were given out to the top 5 “A” players and the top 4 “B” players as follows:

Miguel Torres $ 1,800.00
Hugo Patino $ 1,400.00
Sonny Cho $ 1,000.00
Mazin Shooni $ 800.00
Francisco Parra $ 500.00

Jim Shovak $ 1,000.00
Charles Brown $ 750.00
Felipe Razon $ 500.00
Edwar Gomez $ 250.00

Su Yee Kim Royal Billiards Owner

Two Schuler cues were raffled off and one went to a local player from the room and another went to Yong Park. Miguel Torres finished off the tournament with a brilliant and dazzling display of trick shots that only a handful of players in the world might be able to pull off. In all, it was a fantastic start to the 2007 USBA Tour. Congratulations to all that were involved. The next stop of the Tour will be held at Master Billiards in Sunnyside, NY (Queens) on April 20-22. Reserve your spot as soon as possible by emailing Jim Shovak or call him at: 516-238-6193. Spots will be going fast!