BUENA LANES

champs Mike Fujita & Jacob Potts; Women's Series champ Natalie Jimenez

     Mike Fujita and Jacob Potts captured their first career JBT titles in exciting Southern California Conference action at Ventura's Buena Lanes.

     The scratch division was chopped to 16 semifinalists for best 2-of-3 matchplay using our 'pba' format.  Bowlers found the shark pattern to be about 10 pins a game tougher than the previous day's cheetah pattern, but top seed Cameorn Smith had no troubles, recovering froma game 1 loss for a 2-1 win over #16 Steven Manier.  #2 Foster Phandanouvong, #3 Tim Ursillo, and #4 Fujita all also advanced in a first round that produced unusually few upsets- only #8 Matt Hutchinson and #5 James Hawkins bowed out.

    In the round of eight, Smith swept out #9 Kyle King with 491 for two, Fujita beat #6 Devin Bidwell in two games that cane down to the tenth frame each time, #7 Charlie Hair upset Ursillo 2-0, and Phandanouvong advanced over #12 Jeremy Glover.

   Down to one game semifinal matches, Fujita stopped Smith with a big 255-203 win, while Phandanouvong beat Hair 225-197 to set up the title match.  In that game, the two-handed northern California star was too much for Foster, and he cruised to a 225-194 win and his first career JBT title.

   The handicap division stepladder finals opened with Isaiah Cleveland defeating Samantha Meyers 204-181.  Karlie Loop, making her first finals in a while, then beat Cleveland 190-177.  Jacob Potts then upended Loop 204-183 to reach his first title match.

    Top seed Eric Torrence dominated most of the day, recovering from a late arrival yesterday to easily gain the #1 slot for the finals.  However, he struggled in the championship game, while Potts, with an average under 100, only got less than a 9-count twice, and that was good enough for a 212-181 win and his first career JBT title.

    Another first was produced in JBT Women's Series action, as the talented sister duo of Natalie and Samantha Jimenez rolled off for the day's title.  It's always tough for sisters to play each other, and that factored in to a lower scoring game, with Natalie escaping with the 173-164 win and her second Women's Series win, joining Allie Ijams as the only two-time winners this season.

    Thanks as always to Diane Leseberg and the whole crew at Buena for making it a smooth event in our always-anticipated weekend in Ventura.  Over $2,000 in scholarships were awarded to bowlers of all ages and averages- want in on the fun?  Come on down to the next JBT events, it's as simple as that!