The Chicago Women’s 8 Ball League closed another season in an atmosphere of camaraderie and good sportswomanship. This wasn’t necessarily always the case. This traditionally cut-throat league held its annual all-stars match on Wednesday and the last play of the championship game had women around the table wide-eyed and holding their breath. Karoline of Lost & Found and Loren of Clark’s on Clark were down to the final shots. Karoline sank the 1 and then the 8 to win the game. Or did she? The matches are slop, but Women’s 8 comes with a set of rules over 10 pages long and those rules are taken seriously. While non-players can’t say anything during the game, immediately after it was over, two members jumped up and protested the shots on a technicality.
This had never happened before. Amidst grumblings of ‘play the game over’ and ‘it’s too late’ and the mumblings of the coordinators as they put their heads together to decide what to do, Karoline, the technical winner, stepped up and said ‘We both win, let’s split the winnings.’ And they did.
Unfortunately, Loren had missed a call and it cost her the game, but in the end justice was served and she and Karoline reign as co-champions for 2003-2004.