John Part wins North American Championship
John Part claimed the win in the final tournament of the New Tropicana World Series of Darts Festivals - the North American Darts Championship.
He defeated the American Darin Young who of all the North American participants had shown the most consistent form over all the tournaments
reaching always the best results.
For the three times world champion Part ist was after his weak results in the other Las Vegas tournaments a conciliatory end of the week.
Might be it will give the Canadian who's slided down the ranking in the Order of Merit some lift - Part didn't manage to qualify for
this years World Matchplay.
On his way to the title Part collected wins over Alvin Martin, Greg Lewis, Shawn Brenneman and Chris White, met in the semifinal his
close friend Gary Mawson and in the final the strong playing Darin Young.
Darin Young's way in the final led over victories against Eddie Lawrence, Dan Lauby, Donny Joe and Nico Depaynos into a close semifinal
with the American legend Larry Butler, who showed you still can't him count off.
After his win Part commentated: "It's hard to put into words what this means. In a couple of weeks I might realise the significance
of this but I'm going to enjoy this moment.
Normally I am playing with all the top pros, but this was exclusively a north American event doesn't happen very often.
It does mean a lot and I love to compete and love to win.
I played a lot of friends who I've known for a long time and played many times, like Shawn Brenneman, Chris White, Gary Mawson and Darin Young.
It was an emotional day and not easy to play.
I was very lucky to win the semi-final against Gary Mawson, which was always going to be a hard match because we've been friends
for so long. He had me dead and buried and I got away with it, and maybe there was a touch of luck that I won - and I haven't felt
lucky all week until now!"
Larry Butler, World Matchplay winner in 1994, showed an impressive performance. He managed to win through against such difficult opponents as
Dave Switzer, Scott Kirchner, John Kuczynski, Bill Davis and in the quarterfinals Paul Lim before he failed in the semifinals against
Darin Young.
Last year's champion Scott Burnett was defeated in the quarterfinals by Gary Mawson.
John Part | 6:4 | Chris White |
Darin Young | 6:3 | Nico Depaynos |
Larry Butler | 6:5 | Paul Lim |
Gary Mawson | 6:4 | Scott Burnett |
John Part | 6:5 | Gary Mawson |
Darin Young | 6:5 | Larry Butler |