Our event this weekend was at AMF Chandler lanes. The event drew 94 total entries (63 qualifying & 31 parlays), had 24 cashers, a 1 in 3.9 cash ratio and paid out over $4,400.00 in main and side event prize funds! The players bowled on the PBA 52ft Badger oil pattern that had matched up well with some bowlers to produce some very high scores on the fresh and then scoring increased on the next squad. Most players were playing straight at the headpin or just left of 3rd arrow and it seemed that the players that could control their ball speeds or had a higher rev rate faired the best throughout the day. It was a quirky pattern and was a change of pace for the regulars who haven’t bowled on a long pattern in a while.
As always, we want to welcome our first-time bowlers to the SFT AHT family! Welcome Mark Burright, Annette LaPietra, Harold St. Lawrence, James Leone, Jr., Stacey Lee, Kevin Dollar and Eric Demo to our bowling family! We hope you all had a good time at your first event and we look forward to seeing you at the next one! Also, Kyle Howard, Timothy Satomba, Kevin Dollar and Kyle Davis made the quarterfinals off the $25 economy parlay. We always have one or two bowlers that are able to get through and cash in the quarterfinals from the economy parlay and it’s always great to see players taking advantage of the affordable parlay. Nice bowling to all of you! We also had a few bowlers that haven’t been in the quarterfinals in a while. Congrats to Chris Weyrauch, Rick Barber, Valda McMillan and Larry Thompson!
The quarterfinals were still higher scoring due to this event only being a two-squad event. In our two squad events we do not re-oil the lanes and move straight into the quarterfinals. The A division cut score was +143, B division +99 and C division +94. Since the handicap is 80% of 210, this means the players were bowling 20 to 30 pins over average to advance to the top 2 players, in the whole tournament, in their division. This is a good illustration of how the oil pattern broke down and bowlers were able to take advantage of the higher scoring conditions.
The A Division was led by Troy Blickenstaff and Sean Ashley, who were 2 pins apart from being the #1 seed. In their semi-final match Sean caught fire and was able to defeat Troy, 281 to 210. In the B division, the #1 seed was Andy Morin. Andy would take on Sammi Hernreich for the chance at advancing to the finals. Sammi was able to get by Andy with a score of 221 to 204. The C division was led by Timothy Satomba, who had been hot all day, and joining Tim was newcomer Kevin Dollar. Their semi-final match was a back and forth will both bowlers struggling on the pair. Timothy was able to string a couple of strikes together and beat Kevin 218 to 191.
The final match was a back and forth affair with each bowler feeling out the lanes. Timothy and Sean started out making a few spares while Sammi jumped out to a quick lead with a 4-bagger. Then Timothy missed a couple of makeable spares to dig himself into a small hole. Sean began to get himself lined up, but just couldn’t get any carry. Meanwhile Sammi missed a couple of spares in the 7th and 8th frame to let Timothy back into the match. Timothy was able to strike in the 8th and 9th frame to put some pressure on the other bowlers going into the tenth frame. Sean was first up in the tenth, but still could not get the carry he needed and finished with a 206. Timothy was narrowly able to strike on his first ball in the tenth and was able to fill the rest of the tenth frame. This would force Sammi to have to strike on her first ball for the win. Sammi got up and threw her ball which hit a little high leaving the 7-pin giving Timothy the win, 240 to 231. This is Timothy’s first SFT AHT title and $950.00! Congrats to the other finalists and other cashers today! Thank you for coming out and we look forward to seeing you next Sunday at Brunswick Tri-City!
