Shake, Rattle & Bowl Results - 02/17/13

Well our first weekend out of town for a series of events was a huge success! We kicked off our weekend with a fun 3-game sweeper event on Friday night. This event drew 24 entries, paid out over $500.00 and was won by Ron Gonzales. Our other fun event was Saturday night and was a very fun criss cross doubles format. This event drew 52 total teams, paid out over $1,700.00 and was won by Josh Anthony and Billy Chester. This led us to our main event which had 87 entries, 24 cashers, a 1 in 3.6 cash ratio and paid out over $3,500.00 in the main event. The weekend as a whole drew 50 members, and paid out over $6,000!! I want to thank all of the SFT members for making yet another successful weekend so much fun!

The main event was bowled on the 38ft USBC Blue oil pattern. This pattern ended up being one of the best patterns we have ever used. Nearly every style was represented in the quarter finals, from lefties, to righties and from tweeners to crankers. It was a pattern that could be attacked at different angles and allowed for all styles to compete. However, at the same time it wasn’t very easy either. The cut scores all weekend averaged around +50. It will definitely be a pattern we use again in the future.

I want to welcome the new members that we all got to meet and bowl with this weekend. Josh Childers, Jenni Cahn, James Suchocki, Kim McKay, Karen Butler, James Brebeck, Joey Rosas, Andrea Murray, David Diaz, Leo Gingras, and Josh Rice welcome to the bowling community that is growing each and every tournament. We look forward to seeing you all at your next event, and hope you had a great time at your first event. I also want to congratulate those that made their first quarter finals ever this weekend. Those bowlers were Josh Childers, Jenni Cahn, Josh Anthony, Melissa Tafoya, and Billy Chester. Congrats to all of you for getting that monkey off your back!

This weekend we only had 1 bowler show the power of the parlay, but that bowler REALLY went off and made a lot of money from a very small $25 investment. That bowler was Chris Wheat, and he was having a break out weekend. Chris has bowled in over half a dozen events, and has fared so so. Prior to this event he has made the quarter finals a couple times but hadn’t made it any further. He has gained a lot of experience on the type of tournament patterns we use and has improved more and more over time. This weekend, he bowled won the Economy Parlay on Sunday, advanced on the very next squad. Then since he was projected to advance he was able to pace the final squad for $10, get in the sweeper for $10 and get in the $100 high game pots for another $10. This meant including the $25 he spent on the parlay he had spent $30 more so far. He then proceeded to win TWO of the three high game pots and won the sweeper. This brought him $258 before he was even in the quarter finals. Then in the quarters he made it all the way to the match before the tournament finals. He ended up taking home $190 from the main event prize fund as well. This mean he had paid $55 for the weekend and was taking home nearly $450! That is showing the power of the parlay right there! Great bowling Chris!

After all of the qualifying squads and quarter finals had finished, we were left with 4 players in each division to square off in heads up matches to determine who would be the Cliff Castle champion. In the A division there was #1 seed Lynn Arthur taking on #4 seed Charlie Krauch and #2 seed Josh Anthony taking on #3 seed Billy Pretlove. Josh won his match easily against Billy but the other match was a very dramatic one. Charlie Krauch was behind the entire match but a clutch 4 bagger in the 9th and 10th frame forced Lynn to strike in the first frame to win the match. Lynn didn’t throw the best of shot and got 8 pins. He now had to convert the spare and strike in the fill to tie Charlie and force a roll off. Lynn did just that and the crowd cheered for yet another SFT AHT 9th and 10th frame roll off. Lynn had an open in his 9th frame, and Charlie had a double in the 9th and 10th which shut Lynn our and moved Charlie on to bowl Josh Anthony in the A division finals. The dramatic endings weren’t done yet.

The A division final match was another good one. Charlie Krauch finished first, and in his 10th frame had the opportunity to strike out to shut Josh out. He wasn’t able to and finished with a strike and a 7 spare in the 10th frame. The 7 was very relevant because it now meant that Josh could strike out to win by 1 pin. He needed all three strikes in the tenth to win, anything less meant a tie or he lost. Josh really took his time and threw the first two strikes. He needed one more to win by one. The crowd had all huddled around the pair to watch the dramatic ending. Josh threw a great shot, and the 10 pin was still standing until at the last second it fell forward! The crowd roared at the exciting finish and was ready to watch Josh take on the B division champion for the title!

The B division semis consisted of #1 seed Chris Wheat taking on #4 seed Kevin Enomoto and #2 seed Jenni Cahn taking on #3 seed Joe Claspell. Jenni and Joe’s match was a brutal one with both players not bowling very well but Jenni ended up coming out with the victory. Chris showed that he was still on fire and defeated Kevin easily. This put brand new member Jenni Cahn who was squeaking by every round against Chris Wheat who was experienced and absolutely on fire. Jenni made a ball change and also changed where she was playing on the lanes. She went to a Track 508A all of a sudden started throwing strikes at Chris at will. Chris kept up for a little while but a 2 – 10 in the middle of the match put him too far behind and he couldn’t catch up. Jenni had defeated the weekend’s “Goliath” and was moving on to bowl the final match against Josh Anthony for the tournament title.

The interesting thing about the match between Jenni and Josh was the fact that they both had success in the doubles as well. Josh Anthony won the criss cross doubles, and Jenni had won the bounty for high mixed team with her partner Josh Childers. Now she had to win the tournament by defeating a different Josh. The match was never very close. It was clear that Jenni’s changes in the previous match dramatically improved her ball reaction. She defeated Josh, and took home the title. She also won with the Track 508A which meant she got a free Track ball of her choice! She wasn’t in the progressive pot which meant all of the other quarter finalists received more money because of her victory. Congrats to her and Josh for their success this weekend!

I was also excited to announce information regarding our new Saturday bounties this weekend. All of the Cliff Castle bowlers got to hear about the exciting news before everyone else. We will have emails going out very soon explaining the new exciting addition to standard events on Saturdays. It will be starting at our next event at AMF Deer Valley lanes on Feb. 27th, March 2nd and finals on the March 3rd. See you all there!

Final Match: 

SFT AHT Cliff Castle $1,000 Championship Final Match