Sanders leads bowling qualifiers

By JOHN BASSETTI

sports@vindy.com

HUBBARD

Matt Sanders of Indianapolis is the top qualifier of 16 bowlers slated to return to Bell-Wick today at 10 a.m. for a 12-game round-robin match play format.

That event precedes this afternoon’s stepladder finals to determine the PBA Hubbard Open’s 2018 champion.

Sanders bowled the late shift on Saturday, rolling an eight-game total of 1,826.

He was followed by Tim Foy, Jr. of Seaford, Delaware; Cody Shoemaker of Hanover, Pa.; and Ryan Shafer of Horseheads, N.Y.

Aaron Lorincz of Center Line, Mich., and Graham Fach of Canada were the fifth and sixth-best qualifiers.

Foy, Shoemaker and Shafer were the top three finishers after Saturday’s first squad.

Foy’s eight-game total was 1,824 or plus-224; Shoemaker rolled 1,811 and Shafer had 1,700.

Saturday’s second squad was scheduled to start at 3 p.m., but didn’t get under way for another 90 minutes.

Mechanical issues with some alleys necessitated an arrangement that put five bowlers on a pair of lanes instead of the usual four per pair. That pushed back the B squad’s starting time.

The Hubbard Open had 120 entries, with 60 bowlers per squad scheduled. However, Mason Brantley of Detroit was a no-show that dropped the A squad’s number to 59.

Detroit’s Lonnie Jones, Jr. took part in his first Hubbard Open, but missed the cut. The 41-year-old Jones, now of Ann Arbor, won a national collegiate title with Saginaw Valley State in 1997.

A career highlight for him was winning $50,000 in Las Vegas in 2010.

In his last regional, Jones was runner-up in Monroe, Mich., in November. The 6-foot-6 Jones also played basketball at Oakland (Mich.) Community College and St. Leo College in Florida.

After leaving Bell-Wick Friday at midnight, do-it-all control-desk operator Kandy Budd returned to work on Saturday at 6:30 a.m. for another long day.

Volunteers are Hubbard High bowlers Derrick Cobbin, Kennedy Julius, Megan Toole, Bethany Jones and Maggie Lewis were monitors and the scorekeeper was Nena Asbury of Jackson, Mich.

Friday’s results

Junior-Adult pro-am

Juniors (boys) — Sharpsville’s Evan Muller, Jr. 801 w/handicap and, combined with a pro, 1,540; (girls): Hubbard’s Alexis Cobbin 693 w/handicap and, combined with a pro, 1,457; (adult): Samual Jones 771 w/handicap and, combined with a pro, 1,510.

High school pro-am results

Boys — Commodore Perry (Pa.) 1,075

Mixed — Boardman 1,057

Girls — Lowellville-McDonald 935