48 of the strongest players on the East Coast descended upon Country club USA for the season opener of the New England 9-Ball Series and the $2,630 purse that was up for grabs.
Top seeds on Saturday morning included Tony Ruberto, Jerry Slivka, Randy Labonte, Shane Cote, Mike Minichello, Rich Minichello, Marty Herman, Tom McGonagle, Tom D'Alfonso and Dave Hall.
The hot seat match came down to Mike Dechaine vs Tom D'Alfonso. Tom was the favorite in this match, but the alternating break format seemed to hurt him as he was unable to get a rhythem going and lost 9-4.
On the one loss side, D'Alfonso found a focused Mike Minichello. This match was a real barn burner and the players went game for game until the 15th game when Minichello made a shooting error and Shorty capitalized on it to send Minichello packing in third place.
The fans were looking for the finals to be a dog fight, but it was more of a one way show as Mike Dechaine put on his game face and brought his a game to surprise the whole crowd with a 13-6 victory over D'Alfonso. I want to congratulate Mike on an excellent tournament and I would also like to thank Country Club for hosting such a nice event.
Complete Payouts:
1st Mike Dechaine $1200
2nd Tom D'Alfonso $600
3rd Mike Minichello $300
4th Mike Yamuchi $200
5th/6th John Smith , Steve Therin $100
7th/8th Roger Viver , Rich Minichello $65
