Len Gianfrate and Sean Zeng
Sean Zeng has made a habit of cashing in one Joss NE 9-Ball Tour stop per year. He finished in 7th place at Eastridge Billiards in 2018, 2nd in the second chance tournament at Diamond Billiards in 2019 and 4th at Sharpshooters early last year. Each finish was progressively better each year as far as prize money, but if you are only going to cash in one tour stop a year, you may as well shoot for the moon. He hit the moon at the Joss NE 9-Ball Tour stop at Brickhouse Billiards in Syracuse, NY on June 26th and 27th.
Zeng was one of the forty eight players who competed in this, the second “post covid” stop on the tour. He kicked things off with a win over Jordan Turner and then turned in back to back hill-hill wins over Mike Lally and Bucky Souvanthong. A must less stressful 9-4 win over Tony Antone sent Zeng into Sunday play undefeated.
Zeng kept up his winning ways on Sunday with a 9-4 win over Rohit Aggarwal. On the opposite side of the board, Len Gianfrate had a little more of a problem with Marko Clarke, but won the match 9-7. Zeng would then beat Gianfrate by that same 9-7 scoreline.
On the one loss side, two early tournament favorites were heading towards a showdown. Both Ron Casanzio and Souvanthong had lost their third round matches on Saturday. Souvanthong to Zeng and Casanzio to Dave Grau in a 9-1 match he would likely prefer to forget.
Casanzio and Souvanthong both had five straight match wins on the left side of the board, and faced off against each other for third place. As expected, that match was a close one, that went to Casanzio 7-6. Casanzio would have to settle for second place though, as he then lost to Gianfrate in the semi-final match 7-5.
The rematch between Zeng and Gianfrate only went one set, with Zeng scoring another 9-7 win for his first Joss NE 9-Ball Tour victory.
Sunday’s second chance tournament saw nineteen players looking for their share of $500 in added prize money. The winner’s side came down to Dan Sharlow and Dave Ricci, with Ricci taking the hot-seat 3-1. After Sharlow eliminated Jim Kearney on the one loss side, he came back and avenged his earlier loss with a 3-1 win over Ricci in the first set of the finals. The second set went to Ricci with another 3-1 scoreline for first place.
The Joss NE 9-Ball Tour will take the 4th of July weekend off, and get back to their next event at Utica Billiards on the Boulevard in Utica, NY on July 10th – 11th.
