They’ll always be the first ones.
Emporia High’s inaugural bowling team will make EHS athletic history on Jan. 10 when it opens the first bowling season in Spartans history down in Wichita, and the Spartans are stoked to get things, well, rolling.
“It’s really exciting for all the kids and for myself as well,” coach Rick Carl said. “Because everything we do starts out being a record. So we’re just kind of like breaking barriers, and our goal is try to improve every time we go out, and set the bar high for the next generation that comes along after. ... Hopefully, after this first year, we get a lot of kids excited about it, they become more involved.”
The Emporia school board approved the addition of bowling to the school’s list of sports back in August. Last school year, the school had posted a sign-up sheet to gauge how much interest there would be in bowling if it were added as a sport. EHS principal Scott Sheldon told the school board that 88 students had signed up.
With the inaugural EHS bowling team not allowed to practice officially until Jan. 1, some team members have been at Flint Hills Lanes after school on recent days, doing some practicing on their own. At one of those recent unofficial practices, junior Jacob Loucks showed the stroke and results of a guy who’s done some bowling before. And in fact, Loucks, who also plays baseball and football at EHS, considers bowling to be his best sport.
“I’ve been bowling since I was 4 years old, so I’ve got a lot of experience,” Loucks said. “Plus, my dad’s an avid bowler, he still is. And... I’ve just learned everything I know from him.”
Each bowling team, boys and girls, will consist of six varsity bowlers, six JV bowlers, with some alternates remaining. Mindy Vincent, a senior, doesn’t have a lot of experience other than bowling for fun, but her mother used to bowl in a league, and her grandma still does.
“Usually when I throw a ball, it’s a softball, and so I’m used to turning my body,” she said. “So I think what I kind of need to work on is keeping my shoulders straight and not throwing my arm across my body and just bringing it up to my head.”
At a normal bowling event, a team will send out its bowlers to bowl 10 frames apiece, and the team score for a game will come from the top four scores. But with 24 teams competing, the season-opening Wichita Carroll Quad on Jan. 10 will feature Baker-style bowling, with five bowlers going for two frames apiece per game.
“It’s like a batting order,” Carl said. “Whoever lines up No. 1 will bowl the first and sixth frame, No. 2 will do second and seven, (and so on), and at the end, they’ll just have a team score.
“It’s a different concept, but it gets a lot of teams in there. You get to bowl 12 games. And then we get done, we just match up with different teams all the way through, and after pool (play), we go from there.”
Carl grew up a block away from a bowling alley in Colby and bowled in leagues until graduating from high school. He’s bowled in some leagues as an adult and helped with youth leagues, but this will be his first bowling-coach gig at the high school level. His career-high game is a 245.
“It’s been a process of a long time,” he said of the drive to bring bowling to EHS. “It started seven years ago when I had three kids in my seminar, they were all freshmen, and they were bowlers. And we got to talking, and we thought, the big schools, 6As in Kansas City, the Topeka schools, they had teams. And I thought that it’d be interesting to see if we could get a team started, see if we could.”
Those freshmen are gone from EHS, of course, but the vision they shared with Carl has become a reality. Flint Hills Lanes is sponsoring the team, giving the Spartans free practice time and use of rental equipment, and providing coach expenses and travel costs.
“It’s been a lot of people (who have worked on it), but I can remember those three kids,” Carl said. “They didn’t participate in anything else, but they were bowlers. And I thought they should have the opportunity to show the school, show the community, to excel here at the high school.
“And really, that’s what bowling does. It brings a lot of kids that you don’t ever hear about, gives ’em a chance to participate in something that they’re good at.”
Each bowling event will feature at least three teams. The Spartans will have three home events at Flint Hills Lanes this season: Jan. 30 vs. Hayden and Topeka High, Feb. 16 vs. Junction City and Topeka West, and the Regional event on Feb. 28.
EMPORIA HIGH VARSITY BOWLING SCHEDULE
Jan. 10 — Wichita Carroll Quad (boys 11 a.m., girls 2 p.m.)
Jan. 14 — at Hayden, 3 p.m.
Jan. 22 — at Topeka West, 3:30 p.m.
Jan. 27 — at Manhattan, 3:30 p.m.
Jan. 30 — FLINT HILLS LANES, 3:30 p.m.
Feb. 3 — at Manhattan, 3:30 p.m.
Feb. 16 — FLINT HILLS LANES, 3:30 p.m.
Feb. 21 — League at Manhattan (girls 12:30 p.m., boys 2:30 p.m.)
Feb. 24 — at Junction City, 3:30 p.m.
Feb. 25 — at Shawnee Heights, 3:30 p.m.
Feb. 28 — REGIONAL AT FLINT HILLS LANES, TBA
March 6 — Girls state at Wichita, 4 p.m.
March 7 — Boys state at Wichita, 8 a.m.
rox_alan (anonymous) says...
I'm thrilled that they have brought bowling as a sport in the high school program. It is about time and the kids are the future of the sport of bowling. I've been bowling for over 30 years now and it's one sport that the whole family can enjoy and participate in. Good Luck Spartans and may the ball treat you well and the games be high.
December 24, 2008 at 3:56 p.m. ( permalink | suggest removal )