Johann Chua and Carlo Biado spearheaded the Filipinos’ onslaught after cruising past their separate rivals to advance to the Last 64 of the 2024 US 9-Ball Open Championship at Harrah’s Resort in Atlantic City, New Jersey Thursday, Aug 22 (Manila Time).

Chua unleashed his inner beast and mauled Chinese Taipei’s Liu Ri Teng, 9-1, to arrange a race-to-10 clash with Japan’s Naoyuki Oi in the next round of the six-day competition that features 256 elite billiard players and offers a handsome prize pool of $300,000 or around P16 million.

Before entering the knockout stage, Chua took an early bye then humbled Vietnamese Dang Thanh Kien (9-1).

The pride of Bacolod City is eyeing the coveted title this year after going short multiple times in his previous campaigns including his runner-up honor in the Euro Open recently.

Meanwhile, Biado, a SEAG multi-medalist, stumbled against UK’s Chris Melling (7-9) but regained his composure and beat Venezuela’s Jerry Arvelaez (9-1) to punch his ticket to the single elimination round.

Before inching closer for his second US Open title, Biado received an early bye and destroyed American Robert Hart (9-1) in the second round of the tournament which has been conquered by the Filipinos thrice – Efren “Bata” Reyes (1994), Fil-Canadian Alex Pagulayan (2005), and Biado (2021).

Also moving forward are Lee Vann Corteza, Michael Baoanan, Jeffrey Ignacio, Jefrey Roda, Marvin Asis, Michael Feliciano, and Bernie Regalario.

Unfortunately, Patric Gonzales, Roberto Gomez, Roland Garcia and Anton Raga (no show) were booted out of the tourney.