The Alro Steel – Michigan Junior Masters Association held its 21st Annual Bob Klaczkiewicz Memorial Doubles tournament at Candlelite Bowl in Bridgeport, Michigan. Bob Klein and the rest of the staff at Candlelite are always fantastic hosts and again this year they provided everything needed for a great event, including control of the oil machine.

The challenge of the Guardian surface over wood lanes always is a test for our bowlers but this year, working with the Kegel patterns, we had a real treat awaiting our 37 doubles teams. The early going in qualifying the lane condition was creating a lot of ball changes and scratched heads but in the end, four of the teams managed to finish above the magic 3200 number. Four ladies teams and eight guy’s teams made it to the match play portion of the event on Sunday.

Sunday saw the same struggles as the teams saw on Saturday and it really affected the ladies side of the tournament as the number two qualifiers from Saturday fell out of the top three to not make it to the step-ladder finals. Tori Ferris (Kalamazoo, MI) and Carrie Hopkinson (Drumbo, Ont) paired up to lead the ladies side of the event with the team of Felicia Goll (St Clair Shores, MI) and Kara Richard (Tecumseh, MI) second and Jessica Beach (Portage, MI) paired with Courtney Spaulding (Tecumseh, MI) in third.

In the semi-finals match it was Beach / Spaulding taking control early with strikes in 5 of the first 7 frames while Goll / Richard had a hard time carrying all ten after an opening strike. In the end it was a win for Beach / Spaulding 195 – 167 and a shot at the title in the final match. Ferris / Hopkinson, two of the youngest bowlers in the Alro Steel – MJMA membership, were waiting for their shot at the title as well. The finals match saw a number of swings in the ten frames with each team contributing 3 open frames in the match. This came down to the final frame as Beach came up needing to throw two strikes to win the match but could only get the first one to fall giving the win to Ferris / Hopkinson 180-175.

The guy’s side was no less exciting as the top four teams faced off in the step-ladder finals. In match one it was the team of Josh Brown (Monroe, MI) and Eric Christensen (Wixom, MI) finishing strong with strikes from the 5th frame out to win 255 – 214 over Jon Schiller (Milford, MI) and Bobby Bures (Mentor, OH). In match two Brown / Christensen lost their striking touch through the middle frames and fell to Aaron Lorincz (Belleville, MI) and Justin O’Hara (Westland, MI) 258 – 177 as Lorincz / O’Hara turned the table with a late five bagger to close.
In the finals Lorincz / O’Hara faced off against the tournament leaders Leo Anthony (Port Huron, MI) and James Koss (Brighton, MI). Lorincz / O’Hara started fast with strikes in the first six frames but it was Anthony / Koss who caught fire late and closed with strikes in the last eight frames to win the Junior Doubles title 268 – 222.

Junior Gold spots were also awarded after the qualifying portion of the tournament. Tawny Vollmer (Tecumseh, MI) was the ladies qualifier while Trevor Smith (Howell, MI) and Tyler Green (Kalamazoo, MI) punched their tickets to Indianapolis for this coming July’s National Tournament.

Thanks go out to our presenting sponsor Alro Steel for once again contributing to the scholarship fund for this event, as they do for all our tournaments. The Glick family has been a part of what we do for a number of years now and we really do appreciate what they do to help all our members have a chance to continue their educational process through their generous contributions to the scholarship fund. We are looking forward to continuing our relationship over the coming years, especially as we inch closer to our 25th season in 2010-2011.

Alro Steel – MJMA awarded $3,200.00 in scholarships for this event which brings our yearly total to over $33,000.00 with five tournaments, including the Championship event in June still to be contested.

Our next event will be held on February 14th and 15th in Chesterfield, Michigan at Salt River Lanes. After two straight doubles event, we move our format back to singles for this tournament and with the entries limited to the first 96 bowlers will need to get their entries in as early as possible. Entry forms are available HERE and if you need more information you can CONTACT JERRY TARABEK.

We look forward to seeing everyone in Chesterfield on February 14th, yes that is Valentine’s Day!!!