Larry Kressel (Photo courtesy of Action Pool Tour)
He's never really been out of the East Coast regional tour spotlight, since he first started showing up on AZBilliard payout lists 13 years ago. Larry Kressel was a regular on the Planet Pool, Great Southern Billiard, Jacoby Custom Cues Carolina, and more recently on the Action Pool and Viking Cues' Q City 9-Ball Tours (among others), and even more recently, finished second in the Amateur event of the Super Billiards Expo last month. On the weekend of May 6-7, he chalked up his first win on the Action Pool Tour since 2013, coming from the loss side to meet and defeat hot seat occupant Alan Duty in the finals of an event that drew 32 entrants to Diamond Billiards in Midlothian, VA.
The challenges to his bid for the victory increased steadily through the opening rounds of play as he gave up 2, 3, and 7 racks to Jeff Fulcher, Frances Fernandez and Alvin Thomas, respectively, before facing Duty for the first time in a winners' side semifinal. Jimmy Harris and Alex Travino squared off in the other winners' side semifinal. The increasing number of racks being chalked up against him caught up with Kressel in his first match against Duty. They battled to double hill before Duty advanced to the hot seat match against Harris, who'd sent Travino to the loss side 9-6.
Kressel moved over and picked up Dave Hunt, who, in the midst of a five-match loss side streak, had survived a double hill match against Shane Buchanan and logged a 7-1 victory over Chris Trinidad to reach him. Travino drew Sonny Nassif, who was also in the midst of a five-match, loss-side winning streak, that had included wins over Christopher Wilburn (who would finish this tournament at the top of the tour rankings) and Scott Pulley, both 7-3.
Kressel and Nassif advanced to the quarterfinals; Kressel 7-4 over Hunt, and Nassif, double hill over Travino. Kressel gave up only a single rack in the subsequent quarterfinal match against Nassif, and then locked up in a double hill fight against Harris in the semifinals that eventually sent Kressel to the finals for a re-match versus Duty.
By the time it was over, Kressel's opponents had chalked up every single digit of racks against him, except 5 and 8 (in order; 2, 3, 7, 9, 4, 1 & 6). Duty managed six against him in the final match that ended 11-6 and gave Kressel his first 2017 APT win.
