The Tuesday Nite Mixed league completed its regular season at Orchard Lanes last week, with Double A Orchards taking the second half in a cake walk. They won a whopping 82% of their matches in the second half. The format for the Mixed championship title specifies a four-team roll-off of the first and second place finishers in both halves. The team with the highest total pins in this final three-game match will determine the league champion. The roll-off for the Tuesday Nite Mixed league championship will be conducted at Orchard Lanes this week. Qualifying for the roll-off are the always tough Team Nishi, Jeff Hasegawa, Janet Kawachi, Stuart Kawachi and Joey Sheirbon, who took the first half; Are You Splitting Me, Liz Debates, Austin Reed, Holly Reed and Robert Reed, who finished second in the first half; the hot Double A Orchards crew, Shaiyan Wolf, Daniel Wolf, Aron Asai and Nancy Asai; and Split Faced, Olivia Campbell, Torey Schmidt, Staci Winfield and Wynn Winfield, who finished second in the second half.
TEAM OF THE WEEK:
1. Aaron Troxel730
2 Chad Mason711
3. Lynn Spellman702
4. Patrick Olson698
5. John Riggleman675
3,516 total pins
Last week’s top five individual bowling performances included well-known and fresh faces. All are among the best bowlers in Hood River. Topping our list of ten-pin topplers is Aaron Troxel whose unique thumbless, power game tore up the sticks as he led all scoring in the Industrial league with a fantastic 730 series. The key advantage of Aaron’s style by only inserting his fingers in the ball and cradling it in his palm before releasing it over the foul line is that he can impart buzz-saw like revolutions on his ball, which results in a sharp breaking hook that terrorizes those hapless 3 pound, 6 ounce pins. This was Aaron’s first 700 of the season and with that he raised his current per game average nine pins over last season. He is now carrying a 198 average so he’s knocking on the door of that classy 200 mark, a number all of us bowlers aspire to. He’s got several weeks left in league action so we’re betting he makes it to that milestone 200 average.
Chad Mason also found the range in the Tuesday Nite Mixed as he led the league with a cool 711 set. He’s been a pin busting star ever since his integral performances with the award winning HRVHS bowling team a few years ago. He makes it look easy; being young and strong, Chad chucks the ball with lots of speed that he generates with ease. His speed makes him able to play the lanes with his sharp breaking hook in what we call a down and in line between the first and second arrows. The arrows are aiming targets on the lane about 15 feet over the foul line. Essentially Chad’s line is on the right side of the lane. This produces an optimum angle of entry into the 1-3 pocket at the pins to get strikes. And Chad gets lots of them! This was Chad’s third 700 of the season which boosted him to a 213 average, which makes him one of the best in town.
Washington orchardist extraordinaire John Riggleman led all scoring in the hot-shot Fraternal league with a solid 675 series, which also makes him the anchor man on the vaunted Team of the Week. Making the Big Five is always a feather in your cap because there are lots of excellent high average bowlers in town and they are not easy to beat. John plays the lanes more toward the middle around the third arrow. That’s where more oil is concentrated on the lane which helps him get his ball to slide until it nearly gets to the pins, then it hooks sharply with good power into the pocket. John has also raised his current average nine pins over last season, he’s now carrying a mighty fine 206 average. And those apples John raises are mighty tasty too!
Woody Eskildsen, Mike Bosse and Brian Schubert are also cuffing the sticks rather good lately. Woody notched a nifty 255 game in the Industrial and he’s raised his average an impressive 16 pins per game this season. He’s another smart player who uses that optimum outside down and in line just off the right gutter to crush the sticks. Mike, who is also a proponent of the same high scoring outside line racked up nice 245 and 225 games in the Industrial as he completed a fine 621 series. Strikes came with such ease for Mike, he remained in the hot zone in the Fraternal as he punched out a 241 game. And newcomer Brian, who just got a brand-new high-tech bowling ball, saw it turn his left side slants into a pile of strikes as he scattered the sticks with a smart 237 game and 621 series in the Fraternal which was 122 pins over his average! Good bowling everybody.
The 70th annual Hood River City bowling championships are ongoing this week at Orchard Lanes. We’ll have the results next week.
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