CHARLOTTE, N.C.-- Xiaoting Pan won with a pretty runout; Jeremy Jones just won ugly.
The men's and women's finals of the GenerationPool.com 9-Ball Championships on Thursday night were studies in contrast. While neither match was a work of art, the men could be accused of scribbling on the walls with crayon.
Jones faced off against Ronnie Wiseman in the men's final. Wiseman started off strong and appeared on the verge of a 3-1 lead when he botched a reverse cut on the 2 ball. With the score knotted 2-2, the players traded misses on the 3 ball before Jones took control of the rack for a 3-2 advantage. Tied again at 3-3, Wiseman tried to steer in an 8 ball that clanged off the corner, only to watch Jones miss a cut along the head rail on the same ball. Wiseman dropped the 8 with a thin slice, then promptly scratched. And so it went.
Jones started to pull away with a couple of pretty shots, including a one-rail kick-cut on the 2 in the ninth rack that led to a 6-3 lead, and a cross-side bank on the 3 in the ultimate rack that led to the final margin, 7-4.
With the $15,000 title in hand, Jones consoled good friend Wiseman.
"I told him that as much as I didn't want to win like that, I didn't want to see him lose like that," Jones told the crowd at the Charlotte Convention Center. "We both struggled."
The women's final between Korea's Ga-Young Kim and China's Xiao-Ting Pan went a bit more by the book, but in itself was a study in contrasts. The fiery Kim enjoys playing quickly and stalks the table with a determination that borders in impatience. Pan is a much more considered player, examining each shot with the same care one would afford a venomous cobra that required defanging.
Pan struggled with her break early, coming up dry in the first frame. Kim promptly misplayed the 1 ball, allowing her opponent to run out. The tables turned quickly, however, as Kim took advantage of a Pan miss to knot the score, 1-1, and another errant shot for a 2-1 lead. Kim threatened to build a nearly insurmountable 4-1 advantage in the fifth game when her cue ball slipped into the side pocket on a long position play.
That proved to be the most significant shot of the match, as Pan righted her ship and Kim's play became more erratic. Pan won the next four games as Kim fell into a pattern of making a brilliant shot and then missing a routine cut or misjudging a safety. In the tenth game, Kim hooked herself on the 8 ball, and then left Pan a makeable table-length shot to take control of the rack. Leading 6-4, the tiny Pan crushed the rack on her break -- dropping three balls -- and quickly charted an elegant runout for the $15,000 title.
