(l to r): Abel Rosario & Euryel Castillo
It’s been two Tri-State seasons, but just a little under a year and half since Abel Rosario chalked up a win on the Tri-State Tour. That victory came in March 2018 during the tour’s 2017-2018 season and was more or less just the beginning of what would prove to be Rosario’s best earnings year on record. A month earlier, he’d finished as runner-up on a Tri-State Tour stop. Before the year was over and after the Tri-State season had changed to 2018-2019, Rosario recorded two victories on the Predator Pro Am Tour, including a win in their tour championships in December, which, due to the lateness of the hour, featured a single-game final that Rosario won over hot seat occupant, Ron Bernardo.
On the weekend of August 24-25, Rosario came from the loss side again to snatch victory from the hands of hot seat occupant and relative newcomer, Euryel Castillo, who was looking for his second win on the Tri-State Tour and his first without a no-final-match asterisk, which he’d picked up in March at Cue Bar in Bayside (Queens), NY. The $1,000-added B/C/D event drew 37 entrants to Steinway Billiards in Astoria (Queens), NY.
It was Castillo who, with a double hill win, sent Rosario off to the loss-side races in a winners’ side quarterfinal. Castillo advanced to a winners’ side semifinal against Corey Ward, as Harry Guevarez and Luis Lopez met in the other one.
Castillo advanced to the hot seat match 7-5 over Ward. Guevarez joined him following a 7-4 win over Lopez. Castillo got into the hot seat (as he had in March) with a 7-4 win over Guevarez (it had been “Smiley” Feliz in March).
First up for Rosario on the loss side was Thomas Schreiber, whom he defeated 7-4 to meet and defeat Kirill Safronov 7-5. This set Rosario up to face Luis Lopez, coming over from his winners’ side semifinal loss. Ward drew Mike Strassberg, who’d eliminated Mitra Kanhai 6-4 and Luis Jimenez 7-4.
Rosario and Ward advanced to the quarterfinals; Rosario 8-6 over Lopez and Ward, spoiling Strassberg’s bid for a first Tri-State title since the tour’s 2017-2018 season, 6-2. Rosario and Ward battled to double hill in those quarterfinals before Rosario advanced to meet Guevarez in the semifinals.
Rosario downed Guevarez 7-5 in those semifinals and advanced to meet the man who’d essentially doubled the number of matches he had to play to claim the event title when they met first in the winners’ side quarterfinal (from three to six). Rosario defeated Castillo 9-4 to claim his first 2019 title and his first on the tour’s 2019-2020 season.
Tour representatives thanked Manny Stamatakis and his staff at Steinway Billiards, as well as sponsors John Bender Custom Cues, Ozone Billiards, Sterling Billiards, Kamui, Quick Slick, Billiards Digest, Liquid Shaft Cues, Joe Romer Trophies, and Phil Capelle Publications. The next stop on the Tri-State Tour, scheduled for the weekend of September 7-8, will be a $1,000-added event, hosted by Cue Bar in Bayside (Queens), NY.
