HAZEL DELL LANES

champs Breanne Mattson & Bri Hemming

        It was Ladies' Day at Hazel Dell, as Breanne Mattson and Bri Hemming captured JBT titles in exciting Pacific Northwest Conference action.

        Speaking of talented ladies, Makayla Douglas began the scratch division stepladder finals with a 187-147 win over Thomas Nute.  This is the first time that two girls qualified for the open scratch stepladder since last year in El Paso.  Eddy Smith, who hasn't missed the top 5 yet this season, then defeated Douglas 206-194.  Smith then got by Darren Stanley 203-167 to advance to the title match.

        The challenging Los Angeles pattern caters to Smith's A-game, but top seed Mattson found it to her liking as well, leading a JBT event for the first time.  Breanne showed no first-time jitters, as she easily defeated Smith 212-171, capturing the first title of her JBT career.  Despite many top-5 finishes, it was the first win in open scratch by a female this season.

        Nikita Benton, already a female champion in the handicap division this year, opened up this stepladder finals with a 222-185 win over Kyle Obrist (we think- who can tell the difference between him and twin Kevin?).  Katrina Andersen then eliminated Obrist, the last male standing, with a 217-191 victory in match two.  Hemming then defeated Andersen 198-185 to advance to the title match.

        Top seed Hannah Abney absolutely dominated the tournament, leading all eight rounds and nearly sweeping the brackets.  However, it's tough to 'win the tournament twice', as the stepladder format requires, and the veteran Hemming was able to take advantage of the new situation for Hannah, rolling to a 206-139 win, good for her third career JBT title.  The quickly improving Abney will get her win soon though with performances like that!

        It seems redundant on a day where the girls dominated anyway, but every JBT event is also a Women's Series event, and in that title game, Correen Lieber took down Mattson 171-167 for her 2nd Women's Series win of the season.

        Thanks as always to the staff at Hazel Dell for hosting our Tour.  Over $1,500 was awarded to all ages and averages, even to a few guys!  Want in on the fun?  Just check out our schedule and come on down!