Published: July 05, 2008 01:12 am         

Winning pool player rocks on

Ashley Roulet let background music guide her to win

MANKATO — Some people stop and take a few deep breaths, others bite their finger nails, still others try to think of something completely different.

There are many ways competitors deal with nervousness and, for 17-year-old Ashley Roulet of Mankato, the best option was to groove to the background music.

Singing mostly under her breath, the senior-to-be at Mankato East High School played her way to the singles championship of the Valley National Eight-Ball Association International Junior Championships last weekend at the Alltel Center.

Roulet, who’s been shooting pool since she was eight, dropped just one match en route to winning the title in the 14-17 age group. She bested a field of 34 shooters.

“I was very nervous,” Roulet admitted of her final match. “They were playing good music in the background, stuff like Disturbed and other rock songs, and I just got into the zone with the music. It kept me going, I guess.”

The VNEA International Junior Championships included more than 380 singles players in three age groups. The event included competitors from New Zealand, two provinces in Canada and about 14 states.

The eight-ball singles tournament, which was played all day and most of the evening on Friday, June 27, saw Roulet go undefeated until she reached the finals of the 14-17 winner’s bracket. Although she had never been seriously challenged to that point, she lost and was sent to the loser’s bracket.

Roulet came back to eliminate her only loser’s bracket opponent, earning a rematch with the lone undefeated player left. Roulet won the first race-to-three and then capped her championship with a race-to-two victory in the title match.

Although the championship was a bit unexpected, it was no accident. Roulet has been playing in local pool leagues since the age of 12. Between her sophomore and junior years of high school, she decided to put in significantly more practice time.

“I played on the table a lot last summer,” she said. “I know I’m shooting a lot better right now than I was a year ago. We’ve known for awhile that this year’s tournament was going to be in Mankato so I wanted to get ready for it.”

Ashley’s father, Joel, is also an avid pool player who plays in local C&N pool leagues. Ashley credits her dad with teaching her everything she knows and said she immediately thought of him when she won the championship.

“My parents couldn’t be at the tournament because they were at home building a garage,” Ashley said. “When I saw the trophy I was just wondering what my dad was going to say. I knew he was going to be pretty happy.”

Ashley made it home by 1 a.m. Saturday morning after both her parents were asleep. She placed the trophy on the table with a little note saying she had won and went to bed.

“I couldn’t believe it when I saw that thing,” Joel said of the trophy. “It’s a two-posted trophy that stands about three-feet high. We were so proud we woke her up and congratulated her.”

Spurred on by her win, Roulet intends to enter a few more tournaments next year. In the meantime, she’ll finish her senior year at East and then start looking at pursuing a business major in college.

“It was really exciting when I won because I had never really thought about finishing first,” Roulet said. “When I started winning in the tournament I tried not to get my hopes up. I just played strong, kept my arm down, and tried to stay focused.”

Oh yeah, she sang a few songs, too.