Chau and Ng Conquer All Comers

by Andy Lincoln

The Tiger Tour headed West March 29-30 to Winchester, VA, and found a fantastic new room by the name of Blue Fox Billiards. The room has been open for less than a month, but already the weekend crowds kept the place packed. The tour brought in an additional 63 open division entrants and 13 ladies to claim their stake in the $2,000 added money, with Manuel Chau and Ming Ng winning their respective divisions.

Chau, the 2007 year-end final winner, took on Matt Clatterbuck, the new house pro of Blue Fox Billiards, in the second round. These two rivals fought it out, with Chau winning this one 9-8. Ryan McCreesh and Brandon Shuff both looked strong, advancing over their first three opponents to reach Sunday.

The winners’-side semifinals were uneventful with McCreesh defeating Moore and Chau overcoming Shuff. The hot seat match stayed close, but it was McCreesh taking the 9-6 win over Chau. In the elimination bracket, Moore and Shuff battled it out before each made a mistake at 6-all. Shuff walked away with the fortunate victory, placing Moore into the fourth-place spot. Chau jumped out 6-1 on Shuff but stalled out. Shuff came all the way back to 6-6 before an unlikely scratch on the break ended his tournament. The single-set final race to 11 stayed close most of the way, with McCreesh enjoying the upper hand. Chau closed in at the end and won 11-9.

Thirteen lucky ladies showed up Sunday for the women’s event.  Ng, who won the previous tour stop, started her day with a tough matchup with WPBA pro Megan Minerich, where Ng came out on top 7-5. Ng and My-Hanh Lac reached the hot seat match with comfortable wins over Ji-Hyun Park and Nicole Vincent, respectively. This match turned out to be one-sided, with Lac easily defeating Ng 7-2.

The elimination bracket held few surprises as Park took the fourth spot at the hands of Minerich. Ng and Minerich had a close one with Ng coming out on top again 5-4. The single-set final race to 9 with Lac was much different than the previous meeting. Ng won this one with no problems 9-4.

Open Results:
1st Manuel Chau
2nd Ryan McCreesh
3rd Brandon Shuff
4th Eric Moore
5th Matt Clatterbuck
Paul Adolini
7th Shaun Wilkie
Kevin West
9th Larry Kressel
Steve Fleming
Alan Duty
Dale Kokoski

Women’s Results:
1st Ming Ng
2nd My-Hanh Lac
3rd Megan Minerich
4th Ji-Hyun Park
5th Nicole Vincent
Tonya Schetrompf
7th Judie Wilson
Cheryl Squire