Ryan Cullen, Jeremy Sossei and Yale Billiards Owner Bobby Hilton
The Joss NE 9-Ball Tour Stop at Yale Billiards in Wallingford, CT on July 24th – 25th featured two division winners who will be hoping to build on their weekend wins in the upcoming week.
The main event winner, Jeremy Sossei, will be traveling 2500 miles west this week, as he heads to Tucson, Arizona for the Predator US Pro Billiard Series Stop at Casino Del Sol on July 28th – Aug 1st.
Sossei, a multiple time winner on the Joss NE 9-Ball Tour, found himself in unfamiliar territory after dropping a late Saturday match to Ryan Cullen. Sossei had wins over Lukas Fracasso-Verner, Dave Fernandez and Pete Genovese before dropping a hill-hill match to Cullen late in the day on Saturday. Sossei then defeated Yesid Garibello on the one loss side 7-2 to end his Saturday play.
Sunday was business as usual for Sossei, with wins over Ron Casanzio, Shawn Dickson and Rob Piersa to earn a rematch with Cullen in the double elimination final match. Cullen had come back on Sunday to score wins over Bob Madenjian and Piersa to take his first career Joss Tour hot-seat, with hopes to turn that hot-seat into his first career Joss Tour Win. Cullen would have to wait for that first win though, as Sossei won both sets of the finals 9-4 and then 7-2 for the tournament win.
Sunday’s second chance tournament saw a win from another competitor who will be adding to his frequent flyer miles this week. Lukas Fracasso-Verner will be traveling a little further this week, as he will fly to Las Vegas, Nevada to compete in the Billiard Education Foundation’s Junior National Championship.
After the aforementioned loss to Sossei in the main event, Fracasso-Verner rode the one loss side with a bye and then three match wins before finally dropping a late Saturday match to Steve Mack to finish one spot out of the money. Undeterred, Fracasso-Verner came back for the second chance tournament on Sunday where he had wins over Demian Provost, Darren Jevons and Nick Coppola before dropping the hot-seat match to Joe Darigis 3-2. Fracasso-Verner took that loss in stride and quickly defeated Coppola 3-0 for another shot at Darigis in the finals. He then made the most of that second shot, scoring 3-1 and 3-2 wins for first place.
With the Yale Billiards stop being its final “supplemental tour stop”, the Joss NE 9-Ball Tour will now take three months off before kicking off the official 2021/2022 season at East Ridge Billiards in Rochester, NY on October 2nd – 3rd.
