Stories And Photo Courtesy Of SFT.
Scottsdale - - - Our event this weekend, June 27, was at Bowlero Via Linda and we had a huge turnout for our 2 squad event! We would hit a record with our 1st squad almost capping out with 68 bowlers! We had 119 total entries (77 qualifying and 42 parlays), 32 cashers, 1 in 3.75 cash ratio and paid out over $7,400.00 in main and side event prize funds! The players bowled on a 38ft PBA Mike Aulby oil pattern that was very misleading. Many of the bowlers would think that since there was more oil volume that it would play similar to a house shot, but with all the oil in the front of the lanes it made it very hard to swing the ball. Because the pattern wasn't very long or very short, it allowed players to attack it from all angles. We had straighter players do well and once the pattern started to break down we would see players that like to cover more boards and curve it more find success.
We would like to welcome Gabriel Galindo, Derek Grebe, Sean Harris, Briana Soltis and Jeremy Smith to the SFT family. I hope that you all had a good time and hope to see you again. We also had some Parlay Power Players in Aaron Stein, David Carrington and Orshawante Bryant! They all made it to the quarterfinals off of their $25 Economy Parlay entry with David making it to the Finals! We also want to congratulate Gabriel Galindo, David Carrington, Chris Strehl and William Milho for making their first quarterfinals or their first quarterfinals in quite a while. We would have not one, but two Momma’s Mystery Pot winners. Chris Brunick and William Roberts would win $500.00 each, as Chris would win the pot in the first squad with a score of 224 and William would win on the second squad with a score of 166. Your winner of the free plastic ball raffle, with an option to upgrade to any Track high performance ball for $85.00, was Chris Strehl.
Since this event was only 2 squads, there was no re-oil before the quarterfinals. This resulted in some medium to high scores with the standings being very, very tight. All the Division leaders would be determined by the final game of the quarterfinals. With our 1 in 3 cut ratio from the quarterfinals to the semi-final round, we would cut to the Top 2 in each Division. The A Division would see Brandon Loss (+77) emerge as your #1 seed with a huge scratch 238 game to secure his spot in the semi-finals and he would have to face off with newcomer Gabriel Galindo (+63). The B Division would see Aaron Stein (+41) dominate and he would take on Ron McDonald (+0), who just edged out Bryton Bobbitt for the #2 seed. The C Division would have rising youth bowler Ryan Doyle (+98) as the #1 seed and we would see him matched up against newcomer David Carrington (+92) in the semi-finals.
All three semi-final matches would see the #2 seed advance as the #1 seeds were unable to take advantage of the lane selections that they had made. Gabriel Galindo would upset Brandon Loss in the A Division semi-final throwing a huge 247 game at Brandon (157) to punch his ticket to the Finals. The B Division would see Aaron Stein run out of steam leaving some ugly splits as Ron McDonald was able to stay clean to win the match, 225 to 151. The C Division would be closer as Ryan and David would battle it out, but David would get a 3-bagger in the sixth, seventh and eighth frames to cruise to the win, 247 to 198.
Going into the Finals we would see Gabriel Galindo and David Carrington both making their first Finals and also looking for their 1st AHT SFT title with $1,150 first place prize money. Gabriel is actually Ryan Doyle’s uncle and they were really close to meeting in the Finals together. Hopefully they have a chance down the road at meeting in the Finals; it would be an interesting match for sure. David has been bowling our events off and on and had been bowling well all day. He was one of the Economy Parlay winners and was looking to make the most off his $25.00 economy parlay entry. Ron McDonald was looking for his 5th title and using this tournament to get ready for the TAT in Las Vegas next weekend.
The Final match would see all three bowlers come out firing with each throwing a strike. David and Ron would struggle with one lane while they were able to strike on the other. Gabriel would use this to go nine-spare and strike, strike to close down on the handicap difference that he was giving the other two bowlers. Midway through the match and it was evenly matched. David would open in the seventh as he was unable to convert a baby split. Ron would split in the eighth leaving the 4-6, which he was unable to convert. Gabriel was able to continue to strike and would finish out the match shooting 238 to win the match and get his first title and $1,150.00 prize! Ron and David would battle it out for 2nd place with David finishing with a score of 196 and Ron would be unable to catch him finish in the 3rd at 184. While Gabriel would win the big prize, David would get $600.00 for 2nd place and Ron would get $400.00 for 3rd place.
Thank you to everyone that came out this weekend for our final event of the 2021 Spring Circuit. We will announce your Circuit winners once the points have been updated from this tournament. We are going to be on a two week break and our next event is scheduled at AMF Mesa on Sunday, July 18th.
Hope you all have a safe, happy 4th of July and also good luck to everyone heading up to Las Vegas for the True Amateur Tournament (TAT)!
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Peoria - - - Our event this weekend, June 19, was at AMF Peoria lanes for our first Saturday event in quite a while. We had a really good turnout with 90 entries (60 qualifying and 30 economy parlay), which meant there was an average of 45 bowlers on each squad!!! We would have 24 cashers a 1 in 3.75 cash ratio and a paid out of over $4,700.00 in main and side event prizes! The players bowled on the 45ft Mexico City oil pattern that proved to be very difficult on the fresh. The pattern is longer, but flat which saw an out of bounds if you go your ball too far right too early. The cut scores were pretty low being around +30, which means the players just had to bowl their average to advance. The pattern did allow for players to play a variety of angles and once the pattern started to break down in the later squad, you could see some bowlers open up the lane. The main key for today was to repeat shots and pick up spares. Those that had success were able to stay clean and avoid any ugly splits.
As always we like to welcome all of the new bowlers that came out to join us in their first ever event. Welcome Kody Little, Wanda Parsons and Darron Stewart to the SFT AHT family! We hope all of you had a good time at your first event and hope we see you again soon! We had a couple of Parlay Power Players this weekend in Alec Johnson and Adam Orlopp, who were able to make the quarterfinals on their $25.00 parlay entry. Congrats to William Graham, Rachel Weyrauch, Lordan Ferguson and Roy Gross on making their first quarterfinals or first quarterfinals in a while. Your winner of the free plastic ball raffle, with an option to upgrade to any Track ball for $85.00, was Danielle Whitlock!
Since this was a 2-squad event, we would go straight into the quarterfinals with no re-oil between the last squad and the quarterfinals. Each Division would have 6 bowlers and with our 1 in 3 cut ratio for the quarterfinals, the bowlers would bowl another 3 games with the Top 2 in each Division moving on to the Semi-Final round. The winner of the Semi-Final match would advance to meet the other Division winners. Your #1 seed in the A Division would be Ramsey Basurto (+83) and he would square off with William Graham (+47) who had just bowled a huge 257 in game 3 of the quarterfinals to make it into the semi-finals by 1 pin. In the B Division we would see relative newcomer Lordan Ferguson (+81) come out on top as the #1 seed and he would have to face Rachel Weyrauch (+20). The C Division would have two evenly matched SFT veterans with Steve Convirs as the #1 seed (+45) and he would face Chuck Lucas (+43).
The A Division Semi-Final was back and forth until the final couple of frames. William Graham was giving Ramsey 17 pins in the match and was looking to strike in the ninth and tenth to close the gap and put some pressure on Ramsey. William’s shot in the ninth looked a bit right off his and would catch the friction to come up a bit high on the head pin to split, leaving the 3-4-6-7-10. William would almost convert his spare attempt leaving only the 3-pin. He would strike in the tenth and nine out on the fill to finish at 196. Ramsey would eight spare in the ninth and then split-open in the tenth to win the match with a score of 220.
The B Division semi-final would see Rachel Weyrauch come out hot while Lordan would struggle to get lined up on the pair. Rachel would throw a clean game winning the match easily 247 to 190. In the C Division Semi-Final, we would see both Steve Convirs and Chuck Lucas battle back and forth for most of the match. They both would open with a split in the sixth frame and would match each other until the end with Chuck winning the match 218 to 211. The big difference would end up being the first frame as Steve had left an open while Chuck would pick up his spare and that count made the difference in the match.
Going into the Final match we would see Ramsey and Chuck both looking to get their hands on another AHT SFT title. Ramsey was looking for his 2nd title while Chuck was looking for his 3rd in the last calendar year. Rachel would be making her Finals debut and looking at winning her first title and the $950.00 first place prize.
The Final match would start off with a bang as all three bowlers would strike in the first frame. It looked like everyone had figured out the pattern and it would come down to who would minimize any mistakes. Chuck would split in the second frame (5-6-10) and convert, while Ramsey would chop the 2-4-8 and Rachel would spare for a small lead. Rachel would double in the third and fourth frames to take an early lead while Ramsey would get a 3-bagger to make up for the open in the second frame. Midway through the match Chuck and Rachel would both open in the sixth. Rachel was unable to convert the 4-6-7 split and Chuck would chop the 1-3-9. Ramsey would spare in the sixth to make up some of the difference on Rachel and Chuck. Rachel would get up and strike in the seventh and looked to be back on track.
It would all come down to the tenth frame as all three bowlers had a chance for the win. Chuck was coming off a strike in the ninth and his first ball in the tenth would go high leaving the 2-8. Chuck’s spare attempt would go a bit long picking off the 8-pin to finish at 195. Rachel would need to strike in the tenth to put some pressure on Ramsey to do the same. Her first shot looked like it dropped off her hand early, rolling out to get 4 leaving a nasty split (1-2-3-5-7-9). Rachel would get up and convert the spare. She would need good count on the fill to make Ramsey mark and get good count too. Her fill shot would again go long getting 6 to finish the match at 210. Ramsey would get up needing to mark and get good count. Ramsey’s first shot would hit the pocket leaving a ring ten pin. His spare attempt would go a bit right, but hold on long enough to convert the spare. Ramsey would then throw the ball straight down the lane getting 8 to win the match with a score of 215, giving him his 2nd AHT SFT title and $950.00! Congrats to Rachel on 2nd place and also congrats to Chuck Lucas on taking 3rd place.
Thank you to everyone that came out today and supported the event! We will see you all next Sunday at Bowlero Via Linda for our final event of the 2021 Spring quarterly circuit!