LOPL vs TCPL 1st Annual Summit Series Tournament
blog post courtesy of Mike Dymus
On Saturday March 8th members of the London Ontario Pinball league (LOPL) travelled to compete in a head to head tournament against the Tri-City Pinball League (TCPL) mainly for bragging rights as it was not for any WPPR points. Inspired by the earlier Freestate/Pittsburgh league tournament this was to the best of our knowledge the first league vs league competition in Canada which was dubbed LOPL vs TCPL Summit Series.
A total of 21 players descended on Dan Pither’s Arcade, 10 from each league plus a ‘wild card’ player. The tournament was run on the software created by Marco Wopkes, with 10 pairs of randomly selected players playing a single game on a randomly selected pin (and one player receiving a bye each round). Winners would receive 1 pt as an individual and their respective league would also receive one pt. If a player drew the ‘wild card’ the wild card would represent the competing league. After an hour of warmup and organization the tournament began.
The tournament could not have been more equally balanced. Both leagues had players jumping out to the top of the leader board (Organizer Dan B and LOPL member Steve V) but the pack drew both players back and as others rallied the qualification ended with host Dan P on top of the leader board at 7-2 with a six way log jam of players (3 LOPL and 3 TCPL) tied for the remaining 3 spots in the individual final four playoffs. The 6 way tie break occurred on AFM. Two LOPL members (League president Mike D and member Jeff T) as well as TCPL president Randy W ended up with the top 3 scores and joined Dan P (TCPL) in the 3 game final which ran on MB, TAF and SS.
At this time the league vs league totals were done and the result was a 49-46 victory for the local TCPL league truly a tight match.
Randy had runaway success in the first two games and using the 4-3-2-1 scoring system sat alone at 8 pts with Mike D and Dan P at 5 pts. Going into the final game Randy could only be tied and that would take a last place finish by him coupled with a first place finish by either Mike D or Dan P … and that is precisely what happened. Mike D rallied to put up a massive score on Scared Stiff while Randy did indeed come in 4th so a second playoff tiebreak would be required.
Final Playoff (CCC): TCPL President Randy W versus LOPL President Mike D
This one was epic but not for the play as both players had relatively short ball times and had difficulty scoring. But after his third ball Mike D had a final score of 1.9 million and with Randy around 1 million, victory for either player was not a sure thing. As Randy played his third ball his bonus began to build and as his score approached 1.7 million with 2X bonus victory was in hand … and then a nudge and warning and the dreaded TILT message was displayed negating any possible bonus. However as the TILT message faded from the screen CCC displayed the EXTRA BALL award that Randy had earned just prior to tilting the game (Extra balls were played throughout the tournament) and with this ‘second life’ Randy was able to continue on and surpass the score that Mike D had put up making Randy the first LOPL vs TCPL Summit Series Champion.
