Lovely Prodigy Slams Sessions

Jacoby Cues Great Lakes Tour / Bristol, TN

by David A. Hanshaw

Borderline Billiards in Bristol, TN, welcomed The Jacoby Cues Great Lakes for their September 29-30 stop. The room, which is owned and operated by WPBA pro Janet Atwell, is a beautiful place with great equipment and a full-service bar. Players came from all over the US, Canada, and England to compete for the WPBA qualifier and added prize money.
 
Saturday’s play saw the 15-year-old phenom Liz Lovely of Dayton, OH, taking out her first three opponents without a scare. She bested Tina Hess 7-3, Sunny Ulrich 7-3, and Leanne Amable 7-0 to take her to Sunday’s winners’-side final to face Atlanta’s Betty Sessions, who had posted identical scores of 7-4 in her first three matches against Dana Aft, Amy Chen, and Birmingham, England’s, Maria Catalano. Catalano bounced back on Sunday, besting Ulrich 7-2 and Amable 7-2 before being stopped in a nail-biting semifinal with her second loss to Sessions 7-6.

This set the finals and a rematch for Sessions against Lovely, who had defeated her earlier with little incident. It was not so easy for Lovely the second time. Sessions came out on fire, pitching a shut-out for the first 7 racks before Lovely won a game and started a fire of her own. She gave up only one more rack on her way to the tour’s biggest comeback with a final score of 9-8, giving her the win and WPBA qualifier.