Philippe Lacroix Wins A.B.O Season Opener

Phillipe Lacriox 

By: Markus Noé

This past Saturday at Terminus Billiard and Bar in Gatineau Quebec the A.B.OOttawa/Gatineau tour began its season. Just like in Toronto this past weekend tournament director Michel Meunier announced that there would be a few changes this season.

The first change this year is that there is no longer a division for A/B they have been absorbed into the open division. In previous years the open was reserved for AA-Pro however after a year in which the A/B hovered around 20 players and the open around 25 Meunier decided to host one good tournament rather then two small ones.

Overall a good move as lower ranked players receive good handicaps and a chance to play better players all the while making the prize fund bigger. Meunier also noticed that most amateur leagues around the world are now showing a relaxed dress code, and pointing out how their counterparts in Montreal have done the same. Thus a vote for the dress code was made among the players and it was decided that running shoes and jeans will now be accepted however a collard shirt is still mandatory.

After these announcement where made the 34 players who showed up began play. I struggled in this tournament as it was my first ranked as AA and was only able to win 1 match. Most of the other players who came up from my home room of Rack-M-Up Billiardsshared a similar fate.  Except for Platon Liolios who cruised through his first 3 matches on the winners side in dominate fashion.

In the final 8 which Liolios found himself in, the tournament format changes to single elimination. Here he ran into Terminus regular Philippe Lacroix ranked AA. Lacroix who had to spot 3 on 9 in this match quickly took control and never really let up keeping his opponent off balance the entire match, winning 9-7.

From here Lacroix went on to win his semi-final match and then beat Daniel Desjardin in the final to be crowned the first champion of the year. The next tournament will be held at Dooly's in Ottawa Octobre 18th.

Pay Outs:

1-Philippe Lacroix 400$


2-Daniel Desjardins 220$


3-Sylvain Sigouin 120$


4-Adam Desjardins 120$