A solid break: Lodi grad second at national tournament
Cassandra Ortega started playing pool for fun a decade ago.
Last weekend, the 1999 Lodi High graduate took second place at the Billiard Congress of America Pool League National Championships held in Las Vegas, Nev.
“The last four years I’ve been very competitive,” Ortega said. “I’ve upped my gig.”
Ortega, who now lives in Stockton, rallied after losing her first match to reach the finals of the double-elimination tournament. There were 94 women in the women’s singles division 8 ball. Joey Tohme of New Zealand defeated Ortega in the championship, and Ortega left Nevada with an 8-2 record and a $1,650 cash prize.
The tournament features the top amateur billiard players in and out of the United States, notes Ortega. Nearly half of the competitors also had sponsors. That included Ortega’s opponent in Tohme, whom Ortega noted Tohme had many. Ortega had one: her employer, Golden Gate Electric Service in Galt.
“(Tohme’s sponsors) paid for her shirts, cue sticks, everything,” Ortega said.
Ortega, who played softball as an underclassmen at Lodi High in the mid-late 1990s, and her boyfriend, Bryan Gray of Stockton, competed in the doubles silver scotch division 8 ball in Las Vegas, also last weekend. The couple finished 4-2, which was good for a $100 cash prize.
The only prerequisite to play in the tournament for a billiard player, or players if
they’re playing as a doubles team, is to be a part of a recreational but organized league team. The area couple plays in a league at Diamond Billiards in Modesto.
“The reason you play in a league is to determine how good you are,” Ortega said. “We usually play 8 ball, sometimes 9 ball.”
The participants have to pay $150 to compete in the singles, and $100 for doubles of last weekend’s tournament.
Ortega, 36, and Gray, 33, who has been playing pool for the last 20 years, practice approximately 10 hours a week. That’s prior making the trek into Stanislaus County to play in their weekly games at Diamond Billiards.
“The league is awesome,” said Ortega of playing billiards in Modesto for the last four years. “The players are nice, and the tables are way better. We wanted to find the right league and the right people. It’s worth the drive.”
In 2007, Ortega started shooting billiards for fun. She didn’t visualize that a decade later, she would be playing for a championship of a national tournament.
Ironically, the couple met while they were playing pool in Stockton five years ago.
“We just kept going,” said Ortega of meeting Gray. “We started playing in more pool tournaments.”
Last year, Ortega started playing on the West Coast Women’s tour. She has competed in four tournaments this and last year. The new season starts again next month, and she plans to compete in a few more tournaments before the Christmas holidays arrive in December.