Final Four Set at Straight Pool Championships including Bustamante

The final four are set at the Predator Straight Pool Championships at the Hilton Hotel in East Brunswick, NJ. Niels Feijen will join Nick Van Den Berg, while the Philippines’ Francisco Bustamante and Jasmin Ouschan meet in a final single-elimination round of play on Saturday to determine the champion.

Bustamante was the first to make his way to the final four with an early evening 200-41 victory over Huidj See. The remaining matches played out simultaneously, with Feijen facing USA’s John Schmidt, Thorsten Hohmann versus Nick Van Den Berg and Jasmin Ouschan, continuing an unlikely streak of victories, playing the number-one-seed Oliver Ortmann.

Ahead by two balls at 184-182, Schmidt allowed a moment of pique to cost him the victory, not to mention some cold hard cash. After missing a shot that he presumed signaled victory for his opponent, Schmidt swept his stick across the table and conceded the match to Feijen. Van den Berg was next. He and Hohmann were rarely more than 20 or so balls apart until the score hovered in the area of the 120s, when Van den Berg took repeated command of the racks and finished it at 200-126.