The 2007-08 Rookie and Bowler of the Year in the Alro Steel – MJMA Adam Jablonski (Sterling Heights, mI)broke through in the step ladder finals at Cheery Hill Lanes North in Clarkston, Michigan to win his very first Alro Steel – Michigan Junior Masters Association title by defeating Jon Schiller (Milford, MI) 198-175.

It is not very often a bowler wins both of the highest yearly honors and fails to win a title but that is just what Jablonski did last season. His best previous finish was third place, a number of times. Schiller had reached the finals by defeating Bobby Bures (Mentor, OH) in the semi-finals in a roll-off after the two bowlers tied at 180 after ten frames. Schiller had evened the match by throwing three strikes in the tenth frame. Bures chose to have Schiller throw first in the one-ball elimination and Schiller struck. Bures then threw a great shot but carried only nine and finished third for the event.

In the prior match Schiller had defeated Eric Bracken (Milford, MI) who was bowling in his first step ladder final 189-171 after Bracken had defeated Josh Jablonski (Sterling Heights, Mi), Adam’s older brother, in the first step-ladder match 180-143.

The ladies event was very exciting as well as Felicia Goll (St Clair Shores, MI) won her third Alro Steel – MJMA title by running the ladder from fourth place and eventually defeat the tournament leader Kristy Kerr (Bay City, MI) in a very close match 181-178. Prior to the finals match Goll had defeated two newcomers to the step ladder finals. Carrie Hopkinson (Drumbo, Ont.) was he first opponent and Carrie showed she was there to challenge the established group as she pushed Goll to the tenth frame before succumbing 197-191. The other newcomer was in the next match as Victoria Ferris (Kalamazoo, MI) but Goll was not to be denied here as she advanced with a 192-158 win.

Thanks to Alro Steel for once again sponsoring the event and adding $1,000.00 to the scholarship event and adding in the additions of the 50-50 raffle and the bowling ball raffle, courtesy of Brunswick, we were able to award aver $2,800.00 in scholarships to the 24 bowlers who made it to the match play portion of the event.

The next event will see the Alro Steel – MJMA stop at Plaza Lanes in Plymouth, Michigan for the very first time. The field will be limited to 120 bowlers so make sure that all entries be in as soon as possible to make sure you are not locked out of this inaugural event. We will again be challenging our members with demanding conditions as we will have the lane machine at our disposal.

We also ran the 3rd Alumni Championship event after the juniors bowled and the 20 alumni that showed up to bowl had the privilege of bowling on the same conditions as the juniors had just bowled on. The top eight bowlers after the six game qualifying, advanced to the match play portion of the event. Brandon Tarabek (Grand Rapids, MI) got into the field by rolling a 249 game in the last qualifying game and jumped three bowlers to be in eighth and final qualifying position.

Tournament leader Matt Roberts (Hudsonville, MI) faced Tarabek in the first round but after winning the first game in the best of three match play, Tarabek stormed back to win the next two games and advance to the semi-finals. The other three matches went the minimum two games as Ryan Van Hecke (Sterling Heights, MI), Randy Churchill Jr. (Windsor, Ont.) and John Kaashoek (Jenison, MI) all advanced to the semi Finals.

Kaashoek defeated Van Hecke in the single game elimination 195-171 while Tarabek had to throw 5 strikes in the final six frames to defeat Churchill 200-190. This set up a finals match of two sons of Alro Steel – MJMA Board members with Kaashoek taking charge of the finals match early and he did not look back as he defeated Tarabek and earn the Alumni title and banner with a 237-172 win.

Kaashoek had won one title as a junior bowler in the Alro Steel – MJMA and that was at Cherry Hill Lanes North, six years earlier in 2002. We handed out just short of $1,000.00 in the event and along with the bragging rights for Kaashoek, his Alumni Champion banner will hang along side of the junior champions banner for the next year.

We want to thank all the alumni who came in for the event and we are hoping that next year’s event will draw a larger number of participants. Even though this is a great event and we hope to continue it but need to have a larger participation in order to continue to host this tournament. Let’s hope we can get the word out for next season and get the event moving forward.