Auburn’s pool team approached the Senior Activity Center’s pool room Tuesday afternoon, exactly one member said, like lambs being lead to slaughter.

“Not many people look forward to a whooping,” Daryl Faber, director of the Auburn Parks, Arts and Recreation Department, said with commendable cheer.

Years of painful experience lay behind those words. Faber’s teams have never beaten the senior center’s pool playing aces in the annual mismatch known as the City Parks, Arts and Recreation Department versus Auburn seniors.

Never even come close.

And over the next hour and a half, Mary Brown, Ron Lemmen, Jerry Clayton, Larry Learned, Raleigh Neal, Mike Jelvich, Rich Beard and Duane Goodrow laid yet one more serious whomping on Faber and his gang.

How bad was it? How about 23 games to one.

Pick your metaphor. We prefer “ouch.”

“Hey, it was a lot closer than the score indicated,” Faber said.

Those seniors know how to execute masse curve shots, trap shots, 1 and 2 ball in the corner pocket, you name it. They spend many hours in the pool room studying the intricacies of bank shots and sharpening their skills.

And baby does it show.

“I’m in here about 50 hours a week, something like that, but it’s not my life,” Clayton said. “What I like about it is it’s a game of strategy.”

City team member Craig Hudson, director of Auburn Mountainview Cemetery, contrasted his own skills.

“Last time I played was last Labor Day against my brother,” Hudson said with a laugh.

Of course everything was in fun.

“We’ve never won, but the thing is we’re confident we’re not going to win,” Faber said. “Those guys over there have got some ringers. They play in the senior center league, against Renton, Kent, Bremerton, all these other cities. We don’t play at all. We’re fodder.

“… Participation is way up at the senior center, and one of the reasons is we’re great losers. People like to be around us,” Faber said.

“That’s why they keep inviting us back,” Hudson said.