Western Regional 6W Championship
July 20-23, 2023
Portland, Oregon
The 2023 American Rules Western Regional Championship was played on the lawn at the King City Civic Center just outside Portland Oregon. The finals were a re-match of 2022 Western Regional with Patrick Sweeney again facing Steve Scalpone. Sweeney prevailed with a 24-21 victory to repeat as Western Regional Champion.
The final match seemed pretty routine for the first 30 plus minutes. Neither player got a break going. Sweeney was able to get to 4 and 5 with some two-ball play. Scalpone finally got an attack going and went on a break with black. Unfortunately, he broke down at 2-back. Sweeney missed with yellow, but hit in with red with Scalpone guarding with blue. Sweeney ran a 3-ball break around with red, abandoning prior to making rover, dead on partner. Scalpone missed a long shot. Sweeney ran a 3-ball break with Yellow through rover, failing to peel red, but leaving red in position at rover. With black on the west boundary Sweeney planned to put blue deep towards the north boundary, wired to red and stake out yellow. Unfortunately, Sweeney got a little excited and knocked blue out of bounds leaving yellow exposed by the stake. Scalpone hit in was able to remove red from position and set a break for black. Black ran around and staked out yellow, but blue’s deadness prevented him from setting a break.
The clock was becoming an issue with blue still for hoop 2 and Sweeney leading 24-13. Sweeney stayed away leaving Scalpone to do some tow-balling. Scalpone waited too long to try to attack with black and found himself with less than a minute and blue only at 2-back. Blue scored 2-back but went out of bounds. Red went to red corner Black now in last turns failed to hit blue on the boundary. Blue had one more chance to two-ball, but needed to get all the way to through rover. Scalpone was able score 3-back but rolled past his reception ball in making the hoop. His long roll up at 4-back came up short and missed the long hoop shot.
Steve Scaplone & Patrick Sweeney
FINAL ORDER
1. Patrick Sweeney
2. Steve Scalpone
3. Peter Bach
4. Carl Uhlman
5. Ron Eccles
6. Curtis Toops
7. Nick Gray
8. Wally Clark