The defending champion Renat Denkha has cruised through the group stage of the 2025 United States National Snooker Championship at the The Champion Snooker Club in Concord, California.

The number one seeded player from Chicago was always a very hot favorite to win Group A and advance directly into the round of 16, and he achieved this with ease without losing a single frame and with a top break of 77.

Denkha was one of the five seeded players who won their group to directly advance into the Round of 16, the others being the number three seed Romil Azemat, whose only appearance in the final came back in 2006 when he lost to the late Paul Kimura, who had a perfect record of five wins from five matches played without losing any frames in Group C.

Nevada's number four seed Tom Limor, who had a wonderful run to last year's semifinals, won Group D on frame difference after the top three players of the group all finished with four wins from five matches.

Shakib Nihan Karim of New York, who was another losing semifinalist from last year's Championship, comfortably won Group E as the number five seeded player lost just one frame of his group matches.

The three-time former Champion Sargon Isaac, the Championship's number eight seeded player, also advanced with the perfect Group H record after winning all of his four matches without the loss of a single frame.

The twice former Champion, Ajeya Prabhakar, unseeded for the first time in many years due to his performances in the past three Championships, rolled back the years as he defeated the number two seed Cheang Ciing Yoo in his final Group B match to win the group undefeated.

After an absence of two years while playing on the professional World Snooker Tour, Ahmed Aly Elsayed's return to the Championship started somewhat precariously as he lost his first Group G match. However his performances improved as he secured his next two matches, and then had a very decisive 2-0 victory over the number seven seeded player Andy McCloskey to top the group by virtue of the head-to-head over McCloskey.

Mike Collier overhauled the number six seeded player Arif Mahmood to top Group F, as despite losing to Mahmood in the group, the Californian had a better frame difference from an equal record of three out of four match victrories.

The knockout rounds start today at 9am Pacific Time with the round of 24, where the players who finished in 2nd and 3rd places in the groups play for the right to face the group winners in the round of 16, scheduled to commence at 12pm Pacific Time.

By the end of today's play we will know who the semifinalists are, as the quarterfinal matches are scheduled to get underway at 4pm Pacific Time.

The semifinals will start tomorrow at 9am Pacific Time, with the final scheduled to commence at 3pm Pacific Time.

The group draws, match schedule and results can all be followed in real time by visiting the 2025 United States National Snooker Championship tournament page on Cloud Snooker, which is the USSA's official tournament running and scoring system platform.

» Live scoring link

» Group Match schedule and results