Sixteen Vie To Be Maine’s State Pinball Champion

GORHAM — For 16 pinball aficionados there was no better way to spend a frigid Saturday than competing to become the state’s pinball champion. For hours the players paired off in best four-out-of-seven game rounds to determine who would qualify as the state’s No. 1 pinball player. The winner qualifies to compete against 34 other state champions at the International Flipper Pinball Association’s World Pinball Championship in Las Vegas on March 17. “Come on, let’s go to Las Vegas,” said Jake Erskine of Portland, a league member who laid out the ground rules to competitors at Saturday’s state championship. The state championship, sponsored by the New England Pinball League, took place in Gorham at the home of John Reuter, whose basement and garage house dozens of pinball machines, with such names as The Diner, Dr.