SUNCOAST

champs Dallas Leong & Elijah Lomotan, with women's series winner Randi Speiler

        Dallas Leong and Elijah Lomotan took two different but equally effective paths to victory in exciting JBT action at Suncoast Bowling Center in Las Vegas.

        Bowlers competed in the exciting 'super survivor' format, where after the qualifying round, every game the low game and the low totals were eliminated.  Eight scratch survivors advanced, including Dallas Leong, who had led all five qualifying games.  He then put an exclamation point on his day, firing an exciting perfect 300 to create a virtual lock on the pinfall lead.  Eventually four bowlers remained, and in that round Andrew Guba, making his first scratch finals, bowed out in third, while Talon Hendrickson was eliminated in fourth.  This left Leong and Max Polhill in the title match.  Max has been rapidly improving all season, and it was a great leap forward for him to reach the title game.  He gave Leong all he could handle, but in the end Dallas got the tenth frame mark he needed for a 191-181 win, and the seventh title of his JBT career.

        Fourteen handicap survivors were eventually carved down to five.  In that exciting round, previous day's champ Tyler Thomas rolled a fine 222 but had to bow out with low game, while Dee Handley and Tyler Greene were eliminated with the two lowest totals (if +211 and +214 could be called 'low' on the very high-scoring day). 

        This left Paul Colyer, who had led almost all day, and Elijah Lomotan, who took over the pinfall lead in the tenth game, to play one game for the title.  Colyer has been bowling well all season, and was in command through seven frames, when Lomotan had to consider resigning due to a busted thumb.    Elijah instead threw his remaining shots no-thumb, which he has never done before.  Somehow, he managed marks in all his remaining frames, while a ninth frame open from Colyer sealed the unlikely turnaround.  Lomotan won the match 201-193 for the first title of his JBT career.

        Randi Speiler and Dee Handley, two ladies that have been bowling great lately, squared off for the second straight day in the women's series title match.  Speiler avenged yesterday's loss with a big 248-189 win for the day's girls' title.

        Thanks to the staff at Suncoast for a great job hosting our Tour!  Want in on all the fun?  Just check out our schedule and come on down, that's all you have to do!