mt-laurel-nj-8-6-00
Title: mt-laurel-nj-8-6-00
Author: Pete "Ghetto 13" Flamini
Date: Aug 16, 2000
"Hi, table for 28, non-smoking please. Should be under Star Wars...."
"I'm sorry sir, we don't seem to have that reservation."
Or something like that. This past Sunday was my first Star Wars tournament as a director, and I have to say, it's harder than it looks. There hasn't been a sanctioned Star Wars tournament in South Jersey for quite some time, so I wanted to try to find somewhere for some of our younger local players to get their groove on. I found a store willing to host us, got it posted on the web-site in time to be sanctioned, and tried to get the word out. Most of the tournaments I have been to lately have averaged between 10-15 players, so I figured a store that could seat 12-16 comfortably would be enough. Maybe a game or two on the floor, but nothing too major. Was I ever wrong.
28 players showed up for my first tournament and I'd like to thank everybody who made the trek out to support me. At least ten players made trips of an hour or more each way (one guy even had to take a train), and most of the others had a decent drive to make themselves. Then when they got here, they found themselves standing over display cases for most of the day to play. And not a single person complained. The sportsmanship, maturity, and all-around good time of the tournament has convinced the store owner to let us play there anytime we'd like, and he's also going to make some modifications to allow us more space and comfort.
Some aspects of the tournament were still disappointing to me though, despite no real contention from the players. I had discussed with the storeowner during the week that the tournament should take roughly six hours, and he said this would be no problem. However as we were beginning the fourth game at 3:45, he said we had to be out by 5:30, so the tournament got cut from 6 games to 4. He did promise that going forward he would always clear his schedule to make the time for us. Also, since it was my first tournament, prize support was limited. Ray Bordier was generous enough to donate one of his own R2-D2 shirts for 1st prize (thanks Ray!), plus store credit for 1st, 2nd, and 3rd put up by the shop owner. For 4th through 28th, I donated sleeves containing one useable Japanese card and one rare from DS2/Reflections/EJP. Last place also received a White Border Premiere Vader to help improve his deck.
There were more deck types than you could shake a stick at, I wish I had the time to watch more games. Both new DS2 objectives were being played, some to flip, others not. I believe Luke was even turned to the dark side once. For Light Side EBO and other Matching Pilot Space Decks, Profit, and Anti-Raltiir decks were popular, while RalOps, Court, Cloud City (TDIGWATT & CCT), and TIEs were in the house for Dark. Enough of my babbling, onto the results:
Dark Side Wins: 27 (48%)
Light Side Wins: 29 (52%)
1) Chris Praskac 8(+80)
2) Ray Bordier 8(+63)
3) Brian Kim 8(+55)
4) TJ Holman 6(+45)
5) Wojciech Jankowski 6(+44)
6) Nathan Brown 6(+40)
7) Kim Caton 6(+1)
8) Andy Talaga 5(+48)
9) Jared Napolitano 4(+26)
10) Sean Luhks 4(+20)
11) Eric Slawko 4(+10)
T-12) Richard Haman 4(+7)
T-12) Doug Faust 4(+7)
14) Joseph Young 4(+6)
15) Howard Tat 4(+0)
16) Bart Robinson 4(-11)
17) Greg Hodur 4(-13)
18) George Gundry 4(-20)
19) Gus D'Alessio 4(-23)
20) John Lolli 3(+3)
21) Scott Lingrell 2(+11)
22) Chris Gogolen 2(-28)
23) Pat Brennan 2(-30)
24) Thomas Hermley-Keen 2(-42)
25) Dave Diehl 2(-47)
26) Justin Mausner 0(-70)
27) Henry Tat 0(-82)
28) Harold Tat 0(-90)
Again, I'd like to thank Ray Bordier for donating the R2 shirt, Rich Haman for his help getting everything set-up, and everybody else for coming out and helping make this tourney successful. See you all next Saturday at Cedar Grove!