Great Southern Billiard Tour Win for Archer
Great Southern Billiard Tour / Marietta, GA
by Skip Maloney
Johnny Archer cut through a field of 56 entrants in a Great Southern Billiard Tour stop held at the Marietta Billiard Club in Marietta, GA, on the weekend of April 19-20. Archer and his business partner, Kim Davenport opened the Marietta Billiard Club ten months ago and ended up facing each other twice in this event—once for the hot seat and again in the finals—in the first major event their club has hosted.
To get to the finals, Davenport had to defeat tour director Shannon Daulton, who’d fallen to “The Scorpion” earlier in the day. Daulton moved into the semifinal match against Davenport on the heels of a strong comeback against Larry “The Truth” Nevel, who’d taken a 6-0 lead in the quarterfinals only to drop the next 9 racks. Nevel had moved into the one-loss bracket with a shut-out defeat at the hands of Archer.
In the semifinals, Davenport and Daulton fought back and forth to a 6-all tie before Davenport went up 7-6 and then dropped the 9 on the break to reach hill. Davenport broke for the match win, but after sinking the first two balls, he missed the 3. Daulton, though, was hooked, and while he made a difficult jump shot to sink the 3, he wedged the cue ball right up against the 6, leaving him no shot on the 4. Daulton kicked and scratched, and Davenport ran out to move into the finals.
Archer took a 4-0 lead in the final match before Davenport fought back with two racks. Archer surged again, winning three of the next four games, making it 7-3. Davenport won the next game, but it proved to be his last. Archer broke at 8-4 and ran the table for the event victory.
“I scratched three times on the break,” said Davenport, “so it made it pretty easy for him.”
Results:
1st Johnny Archer
2nd Kim Davenport
3rd Shannon Daulton
4th Larry Nevel
5th Randy Vaughn
Tom Kennedy
7th Monica Webb
Paul Song
9th Mike Laney
Mark Gregory
Jonathan Pinegar
George Rothrock
13th Steve Moore
Louis Ulrich
Victor Bagley
Mitch Yarborough