DIAMOND BILLIARDS

Every Monday, grab your girlfriends and come to Diamonds for the BEST ladies night in Lee County. NO COVER and ladies, you drink FREE wells and drafts from 7pm till CLOSE!

Diamonds offers FREE pool Monday through Friday 11am till 6pm!

Happy hour Monday through Friday 3pm till 7pm. Diamonds has the BEST HAPPY HOUR AROUND!

Within hours of moving to southwest Florida, James Oswalt was in action at a local poolhall against a player with a big-pocketed backer named Ward Huey. And within hours of meeting this retired auto-parts magnate with a yen for poolhalls, Oswalt forged a relationship that would lead to the creation of a $1.3 million poolroom. Now, that's a backer.

In late December, 33-year-old Oswalt and 65-year-old partner Huey opened Diamond Billiards Sports Bar & Grill, after the odd couple spent nearly every day together for two years planning the project. Huey covered the lion's share of the cost, and Oswalt brought the passion and poolroom smarts.

At their initial meeting, "we started talking, and before you know it we were out looking for buildings, " Huey said. "It was really crazy."

The result was a spacious, 10, 000 square foot poolroom in the quickly developing Florida community of Cape Coral that also doubles as the high-end sports bar. The partners knew early on that Diamond needed the dual identity to thrive.

"You're not going to make it just on pool, " said Oswalt, who briefly owned a small poolhall in nearby Fort Myers before selling it and focusing on Diamond.

Currently, 30 percent of Diamond's revenue come from table play, 10 percent from food, and 60 percent from drinks. Huey and Oswalt devoted about 2, 500 square feet to the bar, which is situated at the center of the room and elevated by a couple of feet to stand above the main floor. They gravitated to high-end fixtures, including the bar's granite countertop and nine flat-screen TVs for watching sports via several big-league viewing packages.