Cupid came early for the Boys? and Girls? Varsity Bowling teams on Valentines Day. They both had challenging matches against Swartz Creek this past week, but they were able to pull out victories and stayed alive for the Division title in the Flint Metro League.
The boys started slow in the baker matches, losing 200-188 in the first match and rallying to win the second one 186-160. After winning the total pins for the baker match portion, the boys were up 6-4 with confidence growing, and they ran away and hid from Swartz Creek, beating them 24-6.
Senior Steven Lafnear lead the charge with 10 strikes in the first head to head match, finishing with a season high of 258. He bowled a 213 in game number two to finish with a total of 471 for the day. The boys continued the domination of game one with victories by Senior Brandon Burgess (179), Junior Brandon Wynkoop (202), Senior John Taylor (224) and Junior Mike Magyar (234). Burgess, Taylor and Magyar followed with victories in game two.
With the victory, the boys upped their record to 7-1 in the Flint Metro League, staying in a first place tie with Kearsley and Holly.
The girls had to bowl just as hard to defeat Swartz Creek and stay undefeated. The girls baker match was a mirror image of the boys: they lost the first one 182-160 and rallied 177-153 in match two.
The head to head was not as easy for the girls as it was for the guys. The Wildcats lost the first match in head to head play 804-773. The girls only claimed victory in two of the individual matches, Senior Anna Moses and Junior Sarah Decker. In game two, Senior Kelly Cartner began the rally with an impressive 209-195 victory, and Senior Liz Laframboise followed in Cartner’s footsteps with an 182-150 victory.
The game was in hand, but the match was still up in the air when Senior Ashlee High came up in her last frame. She was calm under pressure and her experience showed: she got two strikes in the final frame to seal the victory and the perfect 8-0 record in the FML.
First place is on the line for both the boys and the girls as they travel to Kearsley, who is tied with the boys for first place at 7-1 and is one game back of the girls in the FML. With wins, the girls could clinch the outright title and the boys would stay atop the standings.