Local squad takes second at BCA Pool League World Championships

By Ryan McCracken on August 6, 2018.

rmccracken@medicinehatnews.com @MHNMcCracken

Five local pool players made the trip to the Rio in Las Vegas for the Billiard Congress of America World 8-Ball Championships last month and returned home as world silver medallists.

The team of Alex Pettyjohn, Dennis Porth Jr., Kim Bohnet, Sean Mckay and Jenman Luk —dubbed fLUKie shtz — battled their way through the B-side to the mixed 8-ball gold team championship match against Aaron Purdy’s Tuscon-based squad, Pockets. Needing to steal two wins away from the A-side winners, Pettyjohn says they came within one shot of forcing a winner-take-all finale.

“It ended up being 12-12 in the race to 13 wins and a guy on my team missed the 8-ball, it was tight, and then the other guy finished it off, so we lost and got second,” said Pettyjohn. “They’re all a race to 13 wins, so five players on each side and they all play each other once, so that’s 25 games. Whichever team gets to 13 wins first wins that match and continues on.”

Pettyjohn added the international stage comes with plenty of added pressure, and finding success can often hinge on the ability to overcome those nerves.

“There’s lots of pressure. You want to try to keep it not pressured, because nobody plays well when they’re pressured — but you’re playing teams from all over the place and everybody wants to do well,” he said. “We just try to remember that they’re just as nervous, if not more nervous than we are. Definitely everybody gets their hands kind of shaking from the nerves and stuff but you’ve got to be able to overcome that and play.”

The second-place finish adds to a wealth of accolades Pettyjohn and his various teammates have collected over the past few years. Pettyjohn and Luk were part of a 2015 team that took first place at the Canadian Cue Sports Western Canadian 8-Ball Championship — alongside Rodney Meredith, Dana Anhorn, Jordan Schibler and Jory Schaufert. Pettyjohn went on to take first at the BCA National 8-Ball Championships Trophy Division last year alongside Schibler, Schaufert, Zane Andrus and Chris Czember.

More recently, Pettyjohn took third at the American Cue Sports National 8-Ball Championships Standard Singles event in Las Vegas.

Pettyjohn added some of his old teammates were unable to make it to this year’s events, which prompted him to create a new squad including Luk and his close friend Porth. The three players will part of another team set to compete at the Canadian 8-Ball Championships in Ontario next March.

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