This weekend’s event was at Brunswick Desert Sky lanes. There were a lot of other events going on, but we were happy to get close to 50 total entries. The players bowled on the 42ft Tokyo oil pattern. It was an easy oil pattern and almost played like a house shot on the fresh. As the lane transitioned, the bowlers could move inside and continue to play along the track which resulted in higher cut scores than the previous few tournaments.
We would like to congratulate our parlay power players Eric Flick and Daniel Austin. These two bowlers were able to make it to the quarterfinals and only had the $25 economy parlay entry fee as their main cost. Congrats guys! Also congrats to Ron McDonald who won the free plastic ball with an option to upgrade to any Track high performance ball for $85.00!
The quarterfinals had similar scoring as qualifying, with marginal scoring but certain players really bowling lights out. Also since there was only five bowlers per division, the top bowler from each division would move straight into the Finals. Those players were Mike Umstead in the A Division who shot +136, Eric Flick in the B division who shot +63 and Daniel Austin in the C Division who shot +136! It was fair to assume that we were going to have a high scoring final match.
Heading into the Final match there were a few storylines to follow. Eric Flick was looking for his 4th title and also trying to make up some ground in the Player of the Year points race. Mike Umstead was looking for his 2nd title and Daniel Austin was looking to for back to back wins, as he had just won last weekend at AMF McRay. The match would start off a bit slow with the bowlers trying to get lined up. Eric Flick would spare, then chop the 2-4-7, leaving the 2 pin, before lining up to shoot a three bagger. Mike Umstead would start off with a washout (1-2-4-10) and only able to pick up the 2-4. He would then go spare, strike, spare, strike in the next few frames. Daniel Austin after missing a ten pin to start would get back to his old form and throw two strikes in a row, then spare and strike in the 5th frame.
Halfway through the match everyone was within a few pins of each other. Mike Umstead would split in the sixth leaving the 2-8-7, but was able to pick up this tricky spare attempt. Eric and Daniel would both spare in the sixth frame to keep pace with each other. Going into the seventh frame Mike Umstead would fail to convert a nine pin spare, opening the door for Eric and Daniel to pass him. Eric was able to strike in the seventh and spare in the eighth, while Daniel opened in the eighth unable to convert the 3-10 split. Mike would struggle with transition and open in the eighth and ninth frames taking him out of the match. Going into the ninth Eric would strike to put himself in position to win the match. The difference in handicap between Eric and Daniel was 11 pins and Eric was in the lead by twenty pins. Daniel would step in the ninth and confidentially strike to give himself a chance in the tenth. Eric would have to strike on his first ball in the tenth to shut out Daniel. Eric’s ball off his hand looked good, but skidded just a little too far leaving a seven pin. He would make his spare and again flat seven pin on his fill to finish at 227. This would force Daniel to double in the tenth to win. Daniel’s first ball was right on point hitting the pocket flush. His second attempt looked a bit inside, but it was able to hold its line and also strike. He would get nine of his fill attempt giving him a score of 237 and his 2nd AHT SFT title in back to back weekends!!! Congrats to Eric Flick on 2nd place and Mike Umstead on 3rd place.
Thank you to everyone that came out to support the event! Hope to see you all next weekend for our 3 squad Standard event on Sunday at Brunswick Kyrene!
