APA Extreme Pool Championship
High Rollers in Vegas
On August 18th I had the honor of being the tournament director and player alternate for 10 of the world’s best Artistic Pool Players as they competed in the 2008 APA Extreme Pool Championship. The players invited were; Bruce “The Big Guy” Barthelette, Sal “Cool Cat” Conti, Charles “Spitball” Darling, Matt “No Fail” MacPhail, Mike “The Tennessee Tarzan” Massey, David “TBD” Nangle, Nick “Quick Nick” Nikolaidis, Stefano “The Master” Pelinga, Tom “Dr. Cue” Rossman and Andy “The Magic Man” Segal. The high rollers had to bow down that weekend and take notice because it isn’t often you see the kind of rolls these players get within 20 feet of where you are sitting.
The tournament was held in conjunction with the APA team national championships. Terry Bell and Larry Hubbard who started the APA were kind enough to let us be a part of the overall experience. The host venue was the Riviera Hotel and Casino. We were given the run of a skybox which, by the end of the week, was in danger of overflowing.
The tournament started earlier in the week with two flights of players in a round robin format. Each match consisted of players choosing shots back and forth, 10 per player for a total of 20 in each match. The winner of each match received a point and tied matches resulting in one half point awarded to each player. Players were building a total in hopes of being seated in the quarter finals and semi-finals. Wednesday night was hectic as players were pulling out all the stops. Witnesses saw everything from one handed jump shots to rolling wing shots. Tom “Dr. Cue” Rossman, a man that has invented countless wing shots, (rolling a ball down table and cutting it in on the fly) gave us yet another moment to remember in his round robin match with Stefano Pelinga. Tom set a small bowling pin on the foot spot of the table and proceeded to roll a 9 ball to the left of the pin and an 8 ball to the right of the pin. He then played a carom wing shot by cutting the 8 in the bottom right hand pocket and caroming over to slice 9 in the other corner pocket. The crowd went nuts.
One of the best things that came out of the round robin matches is that we finally found a nickname worthy of our soft spoken Dave Nangle. In his round robin match against Andy Segal, Dave picks up 3, YES 3! Jump sticks and proceeds to jump 3 balls at once over a stick into the side pocket. What followed was probably one of the funniest things I have ever seen as Andy Segal tried to make the shot. The shot takes a split second once you are lined up. The problem is getting lined up. Andy took about 5 minutes to manipulate the sticks into position for his first attempt. Dave lost that match but won the hearts of all involved as his name was changed from “TBD” (to be determined) to “Triple Jump”. Dave never failed to make this shot in all the matches he played during the week.
The round robin format was intense, Andy Segal and Nick Nikolaidis came through clean with records of 4-0. This automatically put them into the semi-finals.
The quarter-final matchups were a thing of beauty as we saw players that are soon to be in the ESPN World Cup of Trick Shots, face off one on one.
The first match in the quarter-finals saw the stroke and masse’ of Stefano Pelinga against the power of Bruce Barthelette. The match ended with Stefano advancing to meet Nick Nikolaidis. In the match that followed Nick’s speed shots and jumps overtook Stefano and Nick Advanced to the finals.
The second match in the quarter-finals was a match that was standing room only as the “Doctor of Billiardology”, Tom Rossman, faced off against one of the greatest ambassadors of the sport, Mike Massey. Tom and Mike have played each other more times than either of them can count. They are friends in the truest sense of the word and each roots for the other. Throughout the match you could see very little in the way of weakness from either player as Mike matched Tom’s wing shots and Tom matched Mike’s power draw. In the end Tom advanced to the semi-finals to meet Andy Segal where the match was close toward the end but Tom pulled away to earn a spot in the finals against Nick Nikolaidis.
The finals was a great finish to a memorable week. Nick and Tom are both excellent at jump and speed shots as well as wing shots. Nick and Tom both missed Nick’s first chosen shot. Tom choose and made his first shot and Nick followed it up with a make of his own on his way to a great match making 10 of 17 shots while Tom made 7 of 17 giving Nick “Quick Nick” Nikolaidis the win and the title of 2008 APA Extreme Pool Champion. Mike Massey awarded Dave “Triple Jump” Nangle a pool stick in recognition of the shot of the tournament.
One of the organizers and players of the 2008 APA Extreme Pool Championship, Bruce Barthelette standing with the Winner Nick Nikolaidis of Canada.
The standings were as follows:
1. Nick “Quick Nick” Nikolaidis
2. Tom “Dr. Cue” Rossman
3. Andy “The Magic Man” Segal
4. Stefano “The Master” Pelinga
5. Bruce “The Big Guy” Barthelette
6. Mike “The Tennessee Tarzan” Massey
7-10 | Sal “Cool Cat” Conti
7-10 | Charles “Spitball” Darling
7-10
| Matt “No Fail” MacPhail
7-10 | Dave “Triple Jump” Nangle.