Hank Powell
Though junior player Landon Hollingsworth had cashed 11 times on the Viking Cues’ Q City 9-Ball Tour, commencing with a 9th place finish in November, 2018, he’d never finished higher than third. Until this past 4th of July weekend, when he travelled to Borderline Billiards in Bristol, TN. There, he was able to battle for the hot seat, as he’d done this past January versus Dalton Messer, only to be defeated by Messer and then, in the semifinals, by Ed Hernando. So, as presumably the fireworks went on in and around the neighborhood of Borderline Billiards on Saturday night, this time, Hollingsworth and Hank Powell battled for the hot seat, which proved to be the deciding contest, because when Hollingsworth came back from the semifinals at around 3 a.m., he and Powell opted out of the final, which would have been Hollingsworth’s first.
They opted out of a final match, although Hollingsworth edged one step closer to a tour win with his first finish as runner-up. As the undefeated occupant of the hot seat, Powell was the official winner.
They’d met first after Powell had shut out Rudy Hess in one of the winners’ side semifinals and Hollingsworth had defeated Taylor Coffey 6-3 in the other one. Powell then claimed the hot seat in what proved to be his final match 7-3.
Landon Hollingsworth
Over on the loss side, where half of the matches, beginning with the battles for 9/12, went double hill, Hess picked up Reid Vance, who’d chalked up two double hill wins against Joe Woo and Chris Stump to reach him. Coffey drew Michael Bramlett, who’d defeated Rebecca Kaplan 5-2 and chalked up one of the other double hill wins, against Junior Gabriel.
Vance moved into the quarterfinals with a 6-1 win over Hess. Bramlett joined him with a 5-3 victory over Coffey. In the last double hill match of the event, Bramlett took the quarterfinal over Vance.
As late as it was, Hollingsworth took control of his semifinal match against Bramlett and won it 6-2 for the right to play in his first final. It didn’t happen. They negotiated a split of the top two prizes and concluded their 4th of July activities.
Tour directors Herman and Angela Parker thanked Janet Atwell and her Borderline Billiards staff for their hospitality, as well as title sponsor Viking Cues, Bar Pool Tables, Delta 13 Racks, AZBilliards, Tickler Pool Ball Washing Machine, Skyline Construction, Federal Savings Bank Mortgage Division and Dirty South Grind Apparel Co.
The Viking Cues’ Q City 9-Ball Tour will return to Tennessee this weekend, although to a new venue – Jac’s All American Billiards, Brews & More in Newport, TN. They’ll host a $500-added event on the weekend of July 11-12.
