College Billards

M

Myrtle_04

AzB Silver Member
Silver Member
I've been trying to do some research about pool teams in colleges. I saw Mark Wilson got hired as a coach in Missouri. I live in Illinois and i'm looking to transfer in a couple years and was wondering if there were any schools that have college teams. I've search a few schools, but can't really find anything on their websites.

Does anyone have any sources I can look into or ideas of where I can start looking?

I search the forums and nothing really popped out at me on this topic, but you can link me if you know of one. Appreciate any help you can give me.
 
Wow! 64 views and no comments? Is nobody interested in the topic or did I stump the AZ community?
 
Acui

The ACUI sponsors the annual collegiate championships, but those are individual, not team, awards. [Max Eberle, Dan Louie, and Nick Varner all won back to back in their college years...]
this page has ACUI's links to info about college play.
Good luck.

http://www.acui.org/billiards/
 
Last edited:
Thanks Cuedoctor, but the closest school in that list is in Michigan.

Saddle: I saw ACUI earlier while I was researching. I was hoping to find some online information about the schools rather than emailing them, but I guess my best bet would be to email each of the school i'm interested in and see what kind of pool activities they have and then later research their curriculums (gotta love how spell check says I spelled that wrong) to make my final decision.
 
Team college cue sports exists at the club level with tournaments on an ad hoc basis. In the Big Ten Indiana, Purdue, Michigan all have teams and I know Illinois used to. Not sure if the still do. Akron also always had a competitive team and so did Virginia Tech. The biggest college team tournament of the year is hosted by the University of Michigan.
 
Myrtle04...There are several colleges and universities who compete against one another...and it is not connected with ACUI. One of the host schools is Virginia Tech, in Blacksburg VA. If you contact their billiard club president (you can call the St. Activities Director for that person's name and email), he/she can give you a list of the schools that play in their tournament. IIRC, there are about a dozen schools that go every year. Michigan is one of them (and has hosted this event in the past). There also used to be a college tournament invitational tournament down at Texas A&M, in College Station, that would attract 6-8 schools...but I don't know if they still have it or not.

Scott Lee
www.poolknowledge.com
 
Last edited:
Thanks guys. I know there are colleges that compete that aren't in michigan or on the east coast. I'll start emailing some people when I gather some more information. I heard of a guy named Lars I believe that played pool in college. I think somewhere around STL. Not sure how well known he is, but he I heard whispers about him where I'm from so I'm sure he's a solid player. I'm interested in it and I have about a year to make a decision where I want to transfer before I start choosing my electives. Just trying to get some information to get the wheels turning on where I might want to go. Of course school is my main focus, so the curriculum has to be strong. Playing pool while I go to school would just be a nice bonus to add to my academic goals.
 
Myrtle 04...The Lars you're talking about is Lars Vardeman. He was a 3-time ACUI National Champion, and went to school at SIU in Edwardsville (sp?). He also took lessons from Mark Wilson, when he was a teenager.

It would help us help you, if you told us what you really want. For example, since there's no scholarship money, are you looking just for a good school where you can play pool in the ACUI (there are 100's of those)?...or a school that has some kind of pool competitive team? If it's the latter, then the link that cuedoctor gave you has all the necessary information...including the name of the VT billiards club president, like I suggested.

Scott Lee
www.poolknowledge.com
 
Last edited:
Lindenwood University

I know you started out by noting Mark Wilson's recent appointment. FWIW it looks like the program he's setting up at Lindenwood University outside of St. Louis is serious. He and another rep from LU were at the recent BEF junior Nationals and attracted the attention of some of the best junior players in the US, and I think that several of them hope to be in school there in 2012-13. There's also the University of Akron which I believe awards a small billiards scholarship every year.
Take a look at the links on the acui website, there's a series of pdfs from what looks like a billiards digest article from 6-8 years ago discussing college programs, and mentioning most of the programs Scott Lee pointed you to.
 
Myrtle, if you want to get in contact with someone at Indiana University the pool room there is called The Back Alley located in the Indiana Memorial Union. They just hosted the ACUI national championships and have a pool team that's been going for several years. The guy who is in charge of the pool room is named John Bower. I'm sure he could put you in contact with the pool club/team president.
 
To be honest i'm not exactly sure what I want. I'd love to compete, but school has to be my main focus. I don't mind competing on a team or by myself, but going to Michigan or the east coast to somewhere like Virginia isn't really in the cards. I'm 25 and i'm going back to school. I'm a decent player, but I doubt i'm the caliber of some of the Junior players in these national tournaments. More or less i'm just looking for options. The college Mark Wilson is working at is relatively close in comparison, but it's still out of state. As you saw in my previous post Scott, I like teaching. I love the game, but my circumstances have left playing competitive pool as nothing more than a pipe dream so far. I had an idea planted in my head recently about playing pool in college so I thought I would look into it and see what's out there. I'd much rather practice and compete for a school than try to go a not-so straight and narrow road of playing in bars against hustlers. I would assume the University of Illinois would have some kind of team or club for pool. I'm just not sure about how to go about getting the information I want. Pool isn't widely considered a sport so I haven't found anything in ANY of the Athletics categories of the schools I've researched so far.

Hope this helps. I'd be happy to answer any questions you want in order to help me.
 
Information about competitive pool at these universities is probably going to be located on the sites for their student unions or club sports rather than athletics.
 
You may find the following link helpful.

http://www.acui.org/billiards/

Pick out the schools you're most likely to go to and contact the director of their student unions and/or the game room manager and ask about whether they send a team to the ACUI 9 ball event.

Although a couple of years old, you may find this interesting. http://www.acui.org/uploadedFiles/Programs/Student_Programs/Billiards/January%202010%20Campus%20Corner.pdf

I hope this helps and good luck.

I was fortunate enough to represent my school in the ACUI regionals back in the day.
 
Last edited:
StraightPoolIU said:
Information about competitive pool at these universities is probably going to be located on the sites for their student unions or club sports rather than athletics.
Click to expand...

Yea, I was told SIU in Carbondale has several 9ft tables, but I didn't see anything that dealt with pool on their clubs page.
 
Myrtle,

I was college billiard player. I helped create the club at West Virginia University. The best way to see if a university has a club/interested group, is to look at the student activities page and then the clubs and organizations. A lot of members provided you with great contacts.

The only schools I know that host an intercollegiate tournament are the University of Michigan, Radford University, Virginia Tech, and West Virginia University.

The other option as others have stated is to compete in the ACUI National 9-Ball Tournament. First you would have to place a regional ACUI qualifier to compete in the national tournament. The other option is to play in a national independent ACUI qualifier that are occasionally held at the team tournaments listed above.

The biggest advice I have for you is to make sure the university you attend has an ACTIVE billiards club. They may list they have one on the website, but make sure to check in with the Club and Organizations Coordinator to see if they are still active.

Additionally, if you are going to be a full time student without too many other commitments, (no full time job) it is not that difficult to develop a club at a university you want to attend that does not have a club. Just make sure the student union has pool tables, preferably 9-foot tables. These are what students compete on nationally and intercollegiately.

If you have any additional questions, please let me know. I have quite a bit of recent knowledge of the university pool scene.

Thanks,
Ben
 
Why not just look for a school in a city/town that has a good pool scene? You're not going to find any college program that has better competition than a good pool room.
 
Thanks ben.

TSW. It's not so much that i can't find a city with a good pool scene. I'm just looking at options. who doesn't want a chance to compete on a regional or national level? Like I said in my earlier post. The pool scene is full of hustlers. i want an environment where I can practice, learn, and also teach what I know.
 
I drink beer with a 75-83 YO* x-pool coach from UT at Deap Eddie Bar every Wed and Friday nights.

(*) just estimating from his visible age.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top