COLLINSVILLE – Saturday was a good day for Collinsville’s girls bowling team.
The Kahoks took the team lead after the second of six games in the IHSA Triad Regional girls bowling tournament at Collinsville’s Camelot Bowl and never looked back en route to taking the team title to advance to next Saturday’s Belleville East Sectional at Bel-Air Bowl in Belleville. Joining the Kahoks (6,127 pins) at the sectional are Alton (5,577), the host Knights (5,270) and Jersey (5,080).
Rounding out the field (in order of finish) were Highland, Piasa Southwestern, Edwardsville, Civic Memorial, Granite City, Metro East Lutheran, Roxana, Marquette Catholic and East Alton-Wood River.
The Kahoks’ Madisyn Juenger came from behind on the final game of the day to take the individual championship with a six-game total of 1,363, edging out teammates Mikayla Block and Katelynn Wirtel. Alton’s Ashley Heistand (who had the day’s high game of 279 in Game 4) took fourth and Highland’s Emma Schuster rounded out the top five.
Schuster led the 10 bowlers (those on non-qualifying teams) who advanced to the sectional as individuals; others moving on to Belleville were Marquette Catholic’s Shelby Jones, CM’s Ashley Westbrook, Southwestern’s Alyssa Nowell, Highland’s Haley Basler, Edwardsville’s Sydney Sahuri, Granite City’s Ashley Heiman, Edwardsville’s Rachel Mctague, Southwestern’s Kaitlyn Cathorall and Highland’s Molli Pfister.
“I’ve grown up here (at Camelot) and I’ve bowled here since I was little,” Juenger said. “In the morning, I had some troubles; I was trying to get comfortable with the lanes. In the second half, I realized I needed to get it together if I wanted to do this; I wanted to make such an impact and go out with a bang – it’s my senior year.
“I’m really excited (about the sectional); hopefully we can do just as good next week as we did this week. The main goal is to get to Rockford.”
“The girls did a good job,” said Redbird coach Dave Meyer. “We’ve still got to work on some spares this week, but it was a good week; we’ll sort of relax a little bit and start back up again Monday; we still haven’t finished out goal yet. They did a good job today – I’m proud of the girls, proud of the way they’ve worked hard.
“Our ultimate goal isn’t there yet (moving to the Feb. 17-18 IHSA state tournament at Cherry Bowl in Rockford); our goal is to go as a team.”
“Looks like we’re in (to the sectional); that was the goal for the day,” said Panther coach Chris Skinner. “We’ve got five seniors this year and that was one of their goals, to get out of regionals as a team. It’s been a long time since we got a team out; I’m really proud of the way they came together and when someone would have a bad game, someone would have a good game and pick everyone up. It worked out well.
“We had a really good first game to get ourselves off on the right foot, a solid second. Our third game wasn’t very good right before lunch but we stayed in that fourth spot and was able to hold on to it. We were worried about Highland – they made up some ground in Game 5 on us, but we came back and had a pretty solid Game 6. Bethany Stocks bowled really well today; she was our leadoff bowler and was very consistent. She had one hiccup, the rest of the day she was 30-35 pins over her average for the season
“I’m proud of all the girls. They worked together as a team and hopefully we can get better next week and fix some of those hiccups.”
“They’re a group of seniors,” said Kahok coach Sean Hay of his team. “We came out a little rough in the morning and that’s what we’ve kind of been doing all year long; we’re always aware we can bring it back. We’re going to try to tap into that resource for next week to start strong and go from there. This team has been working hard – especially some work during the summer – which has allowed them to get inside when they need to, and that’s something girls teams as a whole have a hard time with.
“They’re good at playing down the rail, but when they have to make a transition left, they have a hard time with it; our girls have been working their tails off and have all developed that game. We’re fortunate we’ve got eight strong bowlers; I just have to pick the right five.”
