10-PIN ALLEY

champs Will Davis & Luke Gartner; Juan Saldana, Jay Heffer, Logan Cain

        Will Davis and Luke Gartner escaped the rising tide and claimed JBT titles in exciting NM-TX Conference action at Tenpin Alley in Las Cruces.

        The scratch division came down to a thrilling match between Davis and Harley Sweigart.  With 40 'lifeline' bonus pins on the line, Sweigart's total pinfall lead was not safe.  Both bowlers came out striking, and after some frustrating bad carry, Harley put together a tenth frame strikeout.  This put Davis in the odd situation of needing to double to win, because strike-spare would be a 237 tie game, which would split the lifeline and let Sweigart keep the total pinfall lead, which is all that matters in this format.  All that went away when Davis threw a brilliant double, earning the 248-237 win, and with the bonus enough pins to catch Harley and earn his second career JBT title.

        The handicap division saw six players left in round five, and in that round only Gartner and Juan Saldana escaped the quickly rising tide to reach the title match.  26 total pins separated them, so with the 60 pin lifeline bonus up for grabs, the winner of the next game would win the tournament.  That final game turned out to be all Luke, as Saldana struggled a bit and Gartner took advantage to win the game and earn the second JBT title of his career.

        It was two first time winners in the subdivisions, as Logan Cain beat Davis to win the U17 event, while Jay Heffer rolled by Kara Thompson for the Priority Girls scratch win.

        Big thanks to the team at Tenpin, especially JBT family Ahkeen and Alyssa Williams, for a great job hosting us.  Want in on all this fun and action?  Just check out our schedule and come on down!