South Jersey pool hall team wins first place in the World Pool Championships

It could be the makings of a dynasty.

For the second time in recent years, a Philadelphia-area team has won first place in the American Poolplayers Association World Pool Championships, an international amateur competition recognized as the world’s largest pool tournament.

You’re Not My Real Mom, the team of eight friends who play out of South Jersey Billiards in Somerdale, proved themselves the best of several hundred teams to become this year’s 8-Ball champions during the multiday tournament held last month in Las Vegas.

Two years ago, Team #LepLife, representing Port Richmond’s Crazy Leprechaun Bar & Grill, brought us glory as the 2022 American Poolplayers Association World Pool 9-Ball champions. The last time teams from our region won titles at the tournament was in the 1990s.

Jason Bowman, APA spokesperson, said the folks back home can be rightfully proud of this bighearted bunch of shooters.

“It takes great skill, teamwork, and perseverance to be the last team standing in a field of 765,” Bowman said. “The team of You’re Not My Real Mom showed great determination and camaraderie en route to winning this year’s 8-Ball World Championship in Vegas.

“Not only did they play great, but they played for one another, and in the end, that made all the difference.”

Even with the big trophy, the $30,000 in prize money, and the huge round of applause that greeted the six-man/two-woman team when they returned to their home pool hall after the Vegas victory, the championship is still sinking in.

“It still feels like a dream to us,” said team captain Brianna Aristeo, 33, of Cinnaminson. “Like we’re still not really settled in on it.”

How they pulled off their great feat is no mystery when you hear their story. They’ve all got day jobs — health care, sales, marketing, welding, public utilities, construction, corrections — but pool is their passion. Their friends are pool players; some of the shooters from the Crazy Leprechaun team were there in Vegas, cheering them on. There are two couples on the team — and they both met playing competitive pool.

To hear these players tell it, the secrets of their success are simple: they work really hard, and they always have each other’s backs.

“We practiced a lot,” said Brad Silver, 35, a solar salesman from Galloway who potted the team’s winning ball. “Winning this is like a dream for everyone, so I think you try to do everything that’s in your power to get ready.”

Silver listened to audiobooks on the champion mindset and sports psychology. Some team members took formal pool lessons. As soon as they landed in Vegas, they found a pool hall and started practicing some more, on top of all the preparations they had done back home.

“We spent, I don’t know, hundreds if not thousands of hours, practicing and preparing,” Silver said.

But friendship is their secret weapon. Even their team name is a nod to those ties.

Before Vegas, they were Built For This — chosen to show how serious they were about playing to win. But half of them also played on a team called You’re Not My Real Dad — a joking retort one of the players always came out with when his teammates tried to tell him what to do. The two teams played against each other in a tournament at Harrah’s in Atlantic City to qualify for a spot in Vegas. When Built For This won, they changed their name to You’re Not My Real Mom to honor their friends.

In Vegas, the team’s mutual support ramped up even more.

“Why not us?” became their mantra.

It started as a joke among friends, but they kept repeating it to each other before each match. And they kept winning.

At times the pressure and tension got intense. Among some of the other teams, groans of displeasure were audible and grimaces of disappointment went unhidden when their teammates missed a shot or lost a rack. But not the South Jersey shooters.

“I didn’t see any of that on our team at all,” said Tony Zubec, 51, a municipal utility foreman from Paulsboro who’s been playing pool since he was 5. “Everybody was out there to do their best, and that’s all they can do — just give everything they have.

“If it was good enough, that’s great. If it wasn’t good enough, it’s still great,” added Zubec, who made it to the Vegas tournament for the first time this year, and with two teams, the South Jersey team and another, Everybody Love Raymond, that included his mother, wife, son, and a friend. “We just did the whole thing together.”

“We all had faith in each other,” said Aristeo, who is studying to be a dental hygienist. “I feel like that was a game changer for us, because no matter what, we were doing this.”

During the tournament, teams were allowed to call timeouts to strategize during pivotal points of play. The South Jersey team used their timeouts somewhat differently.

“I can’t tell you how many times we called a timeout during this tournament just to go up and say, ‘Remember who you are, you got this. We love you. No matter what happens, you’re good,’” Silver said.

He got one of those pep talks — and at a crucial juncture. He was shooting against STR8 Ballin’ of Toronto’s best player in the finals of the 8-Ball competition. Silver was down 0-2, when his teammates called a time out.

When Silver went back to the table, he won five racks in a row.

It’s been a whirlwind ever since. Later this month, the APA of South Jersey is throwing the team a big fete at the Vüe rooftop bar at the Claridge in Atlantic City. But even before the team members left Vegas, total strangers who saw their photos on social media were approaching them to give congratulations.

“One of the guys got recognized at a urinal at the airport,” Silver said.

Back home, it still hasn’t let up.

“I am shocked by the number of people that know because it’s not like I came home and set banners up,” Zubec said. “People that you would never expect I would hear from, or I would see in a local store, and it would just be like, ‘Congratulations! Congratulations!’”

More than likely, these South Jersey shooting stars will get to bask in the glory of shout-outs at their local Wawa and enjoy hearty handshakes, and free drinks at their local watering holes for a while to come.

If there was another magic factor in their triumphant run against teams from all over the U.S., not to mention Canada, Japan, and Singapore, Silver would say maybe where they’re from also gave them the edge.

“People from our area, we’re diehard sports people. Anybody from the Philadelphia area. We look at competition differently in this area,” Silver said. “I think the East Coast has more heart. Our Philadelphia area, in particular, has more heart.

“We’re just built different in Philly.”