You got trouble, folks, right here in River City, trouble with a capital ‘T’ And that rhymes with ‘P’ and that stands for pool

                           Ya Got Trouble, from The Music Man (1957), by Meredith Wilson

Apparently concerned yet unfazed by Robert Preston’s cautionary message, Darryl Doolittle’s mom deposited her eight-year-old son at Jigger’s pool hall in Hagersville, Ont., more than half a century ago and told him to “keep an eye on” his dad.

Darryl Doolittle never looked back.

“Since I picked up that cue, I loved this game,” he said after sweeping all three titles—team, doubles and singles—at the 2024 Legion national eight-ball championships May 24-27 in beautiful Hartland, N.B.

“All my life—that’s 52 years ago. That’s a true story.”

Doolittle, a worker at the Grand River Enterprises cigarette factory on the Six Nations Reserve, ran the table in five of six playoff games while sweeping Carl Ringer of Labrador City, N.L., Branch; Craig Walters of Victoria’s Britannia Branch; and Ontario teammate Mark Johnston of his own Valley City Branch in Dundas.

Doolittle and Johnston took a three-of-five doubles playoff in four games against Ringer and David Locke of Labrador City. The two teamed with Brandon Raddatz and Colton Keuhl of Eganville, Ont., to edge the Nova Scotia foursome of Bob Massia, Christopher Marsh, Bruce Lilly and Harry O’Donnell of Centennial Branch in Dartmouth 46-45 and clinch the team event in the round robin.

Champions representing all provinces and territories except Quebec, along with a host team from Hartland, played 360 round-robin games during two days before Ontario went up against Newfoundland and Labrador in the doubles tiebreaker.

Four players were forced into a tiebreaking finale in singles. They played each other twice. Both Doolittle and Johnston swept Ringer and Walters, winning four games each before facing off for the title. Ringer and Walters settled on a tie for third.

With 40 players and three tables to work with, the host branch’s pool chair, Carla Orser, and tournament director Bob Allison ran a tight ship. An organizing committee of some 20 branch members put the weekend together, complete with steak and moose burger barbecues, a closing turkey dinner, and live music.

Orser, Allison and other branch members, along with a handful of players, refereed the matches and, while there were discussions on a few rulings, there were no significant disputes.

Well-run and well-contested, the event amid the flowing waterways, rolling farmlands and verdant hills of western New Brunswick went off without a hitch.

“We have an outstanding team here and they pulled it off—in spades,” said Branch President Gary Bovard, a legionnaire since 1979. “I told the executive and pretty well anyone who would listen…I didn’t care if we didn’t make one red cent from it…we were going to show the [124-member] branch in its best light.

“Anyone who gets the opportunity to host an event such as this, I would fully encourage them,” he added. “It tightens up your executive, your members, your volunteer base, and it can really make your branch shine.”