Bowman, Jones and Rousey Outshoot the Shooters Field
Midwest 9-Ball Tour / Olathe, KS
by Lea Andrews
Though James Barracks tried twice to take him down, Jesse Bowman turned out to be invincible in the 9-ball division of the February 18-21 Midwest 9-Ball Tour stop. The $5,000-added event, which also featured a 45-player one-pocket division and a 21-entrant ladies’ division, drew 100 9-ball contenders to Shooters in Olathe, KS.
After getting past Jeremy “Double J” Jones 9-4, Bowman met up with Barracks for the first time in the hot seat match. Barracks was coming off a smooth 9-2 win over Jon Kucharo, but he couldn’t manage to mark up the final game against Bowman, who claimed the hot seat 9-8.
On the one-loss side, Jason Klatt was making a run for the finals, ousting Sean Turner 9-6 to face Will Freeman, who’d notched his own 9-6 victory over Dustin Gunia. Holding Freeman to five games, Klatt moved on to Kucharo. Meanwhile, Dan Olson got past Darryl Smith 9-6 to meet up with Shane McMinn, who’d taken care of Taylor Anderson 9-3. A 9-6 victory pitted Olson against Jones, who pushed his way 9-7 into the quarterfinals, where he met up with Klatt. Fresh off a 9-6 win over Kucharo, Klatt rode the momentum into his match with Jones, whom he held to just three games. That score got flipped on him in the semifinals, though, as Barracks fought for his rematch with Bowman.
The true double-elimination final match featured two players for whom break and runs are the norm, but Bowman took advantage of a few of Barracks’ dry breaks to take his victory in one set 9-6.
In the one-pocket division, Jeremy Jones took the hot seat with a 3-1 victory over Joe Gray. On the left side of the bracket, Jesse Bowman made his way past Dale Pence and Mike Banks Jr. to face Gray in the semifinals, but Gray put him in third 3-2 to get another crack at Jones in the true double-elimination final match, but he didn’t fare any better the second time around, as Jones took care of him 3-1 once again.
In the ladies’ division, Sarah Rousey was the one to beat, and though Rhonda Pierce came closest in the hot seat match, she couldn’t take the final game, and Rousey took the set 7-6. On the one-loss side, Jeannie Vogelsang, who’d taken a first-round loss to Apryl McGill, made her way steadily through the field, finishing up with wins over Cindy Wessling 7-2 and Michelle McDermott 7-5 to reach the semifinals, where she breezed through Pierce 7-3. Rousey proved to be quite a different story, though, marking up game after game in the true-double elimination final match to earn her victory in one decisive 7-0 set.
Jones bested Joe Gray twice, once in the hot seat match and once in the finals of the One-Pocket event at Shooters in Olathe, KS.
One-Pocket Results:
1st Jeremy Jones
2nd Joe Gray
3rd Jesse Bowman
4th Mike Banks, Jr.
5th Dale Pence
Gary Lutman
7th Danny Harriman
K.C. Massey
9th Jerry Reardon
Randy Cole
Mickey Brandt
Chip Compton
9-Ball Results:
1st Jesse Bowman
2nd James Barracks
3rd Jason Klatt
4th Jeremy Jones
5th Dan Olson
Jon Kucharo
7th Shane McMinn
Will Freeman
9th Darryl Smith
Taylor Anderson
Dustin Gunia
Sean Turner
13th Chase Rudder
Jody McLaughlin
Chad Bilmont
Gary Lutman
17th Jeff Trent
John Gabriel
Jerry Reardon
Lloyd Moreland
Daniel Herring
Kevin Condreay
David Matlock
Jordan Davis
Ladies’ Results:
1st Sarah Rousey
2nd Jeannie Vogelsang
3rd Rhonda Pierce
4th Michelle McDermott
5th Cindy Wessling
Apryl McGill