The 2008 Maryland Open Straight Pool Championship and World 14.1
Qualifier is officially underway at Big Daddy's Billiards in Glen
Burnie, Maryland as of 10:30 a.m. this morning. This year boasts a
full field of thirty-two of the toughest east coast straight pool
players with a total of two last minute replacements which included
Michael S. Frank of Hanover, Maryland (replacing Gina Kim-Lipsky); and
Danny Green was replaced by Bob Chamberlain of Dale City, Virginia.
As of this time, New York's Danny Barouty has jumped out to a great
start with a first round win over Larry Moy 100-2; Steve Lipsky bested
travel partner Michael Yednak 100-48; Bob Maidhof held Don Polo to a
100-9 finish; and Maryland's own Shaun Wilkie ended his match over Bob
McLeod 100-29.
The players are divided into eight flights, four players each
(including an A-B-C-D player), playing 100 point matches. The top two
players in each group at the end of the day today will advance to a
seeded single elimination tournament on Sunday. The eight first place
finishers from each flight will be seeded 1-8 on Sunday based on W-L
record and ball count differential (ex. a player who wins matches
100-20 is seeded ahead of a player whose average wins are 100-30, etc).
So, there is an emphasis on winning by a larger margin rather than
just a simple win, since many of the top players are expected to be 3-0
after today's matches.
The second place finishers in each flight also advance to Sunday and
will be seeded 9-16 on the same basis. In the Sunday single
elimination tournament #1 plays #16, # 2 seed plays #15 and so on. The
past three years championship matches saw 2005 Ryan McCreesh defeat Ed
Deska; 2006 Ed Hodan defeat Danny Barouty; and last year 2007 Mika
Immonen over Mike Davis. This year is looking to see some strong
finishes on Sunday so stay tuned as updates will be made available
throughout the day.
Online Brackets
