The Wayland boys’ varsity bowling team Wednesday bounced back from a recent funk by edging Middleville Thornapple Kellogg 16-14.
“What has been a struggle for the boys this year have been their Baker games,” explained coach Sherry Miklusicak.
But Wednesday the Wildcats shot 204 to TK’s 195 and 190 to TK’s 211.
“In our first match we met our goal of having no more than one open,” the coach said. “If we met that goal in match two, we would have came away with another win. Even though we were down by two points because of total pins, we were in a good position because the previous couple of weeks we found ourselves down 10 points.”
In what was the last conference match of the season, the Wayland boys shot a combined 888 game. Alex Marble 158, Joe Laidler 176, Bryan Franck 175, Dillon Smith 224, and Dylan Roberts 165. The ‘Cats won 4 of the 5 individual points and took the total by 43 pins.
“Even though our lead was now 12 to 6, we couldn’t get sloppy,” Miklusicak said.
Christian Courser had a good week at practice so he came in for game two and contributed a 182 to the team, while Joe Laidler had 161, Bryan Franck a 175 (same as his first game), Dylan Roberts 153, and Dillon Smith 170.
“This match was much closer as we blew a couple of crucial final frames,” Miklusicak said.
Wayland We only two individual points and lost the total pins for this match. Fortunately, it had enough pins from match one to hold up and take the grand total for the win.
“We have had many close matches this year,” the coach said. “Previously we were beaten by TK even though our pin total was exactly the same. Tonight the pin differential was just four pins and thankfully it was in our favor.
“So in the 24 games Wayland and Middleville bowled this season there was a difference of just four pins. That is crazy.”
After the match, Wildcats took a few moments to honor seniors who were on the team all four years Bryan Franck and Jordan Peters. Hunter Osborn was a member for three years and Mike Cole for two years.
“My hope for them is to continue bowling as it is an enjoyable (sometimes frustrating) life-long sport.
The Wildcats, now 7-11 in dual matches overall this season, will move on to the conference tournament Saturday at Park Lanes on 28th Street. Their goal is to move up a few places in the conference and gain some ground on teams they shouldn’t have lost to this season.
