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Dave Metzger, Barrington Beavis and
Barry Shoults were part of a three-way tie in their pod with
Barrington advancing by tiebreakers. |
Chris Yaure and Bob Wicks battle in
a pod won by Steve Raszewski who is seen in the background. |
Two More to Go ...
Battle Line remained consistent as 36 'regulars' appeared
for its usual time slot even though we were up against the ever
popular Lost Cities, again. Nine 4-player pods were formed
and the fun began.
Aaron Fuegi swept Group 1 that included Puerto Rico
superstar David Platnick. All three of his wins came via breakthrough.
Group 2 included celebrated designer Matt Calkins (Sekigahara).
Unfortunately for Matt his Battle Line skills were not
up to his design expertise and Phil Rennert swept the lot to
advance.
Steve Raszewski continued the sweep streak in Group 3 over
Chris Yaure, Bob Wicks and Dave Rohde who all remained laurel-less.
Andrew Long won the tie-breaker to be the first to advance
with a 2-1 record.
Your trusty GM accomplished a first since Battle Line
went to pod play nine years ago. I lost a game and failed to
advance. I beat Tom Knapp and Lisa Gutermuth in the first two
games, but in the third the cards went south against Doug Galullo.
I needed Lisa to beat Tom to send it to a 3-way tie breaker.
She didn't and Doug advanced by beating me head to head. There
are rumors that Don paid Lisa to throw the game. (I would
have, but I was busy.)
Gordon Rodgers, of Philadelphia fame, easily advanced out
of Group 6 to join the playoff party.
Defending Champion Sean 'the hammer' McCulloch swept Group
7 but it wasn't easy, barely beating Chris Moffa 5-4. Barely
surviving was the story of Sean's night....
In Group 8 Jeffy Mullet squeaked out two 5-3 victories over
a pair of Michaels (Wojke and Powers) and then beat David Gubbay
via breakthrough to advance.
And in Group 9 Don's favorite Battleline player Barrington
Beavis, won a three-way tie-breaker to become the last qualifier.
With nine winners, we drew lots from the 2-1 qualifiers for
a 'play in game'. Doug Galullo beat Andrew Long in the extra
round to advance against the defending champion. Sean proceeded
to kick Doug to the curb and reached the semifinals. Gordon Rodgers
beat Phil Rennert in their quarterfinal to do battle with Sean.
The champ demonstrated why he was the champ and won via breakthrough
against Gordon to return to the Final.
In the other half of the bracket Jeffy squeaked by Fuegi to
make the semis. His opponent would be Steve Raszewski who advanced
over Barrington Beavis. Jeffy made it an "ALL CABS, NON-REIFF
FINAL" by beating Steve via breakthrough.
Alas, I had to miss that historic occasion to go to Harrisburg
to pick up my daughter from the airport with Harry Flawd (thanks
again Harry!) so knowing that my two friends wouldn't kill each
other, I left Lisa Gutermuth in charge. About 45 minutes later
I get a text from Jeffy saying "Woo Hoo. World Champion."
Unfortunately for him, Sean was the world champion, beating him
in a 5-4 barn burner. Sean won two columns with 10's as he got
all six of them. Sean now only needs two more in a row to match
me. Until next year!
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Doug Galullo's win over you-know-who
as Tom Knapp beat Lisa Gutermuth sent Reiff to the showers by
tiebreaker. |
The all-CABS Final ensured a sixth
straight CABS Battle Line champ despite the efforts of
the Duke cheerleading squad. |
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