Erb & Vaughn Become 1st PJBT Winners of 2017 Calendar Year

The PJBT continued Season 18 with our first event of the 2017 Calendar Year.  On this day, the PJBT travels to Reading, PA, and Hiester Lanes for a regular season singles event.  This center always is a good draw for our youth bowlers and this day did not disappoint.  We had 79 bowlers competing on this day with 47 in Scratch and 32 in Handicap.  This event was our normal singles format.  5 games qualifying / top 40% advance to 3 additional games of match play / Top 5 Advance to stepladder final.  The lane condition for this event was house.

In Scratch, Eric Erb became the 3rd veteran PJBT bowler of the year to hit the “10 Title Threshold.”  Erb captured the title, which was his 10th career PJBT title.  He joined Dylan Zimmerman and Brandon Runk, who also accomplished the same feat earlier this year.  His 10th title will put him certainly in the running for the PJBT 2nd All-Decade Team in a couple of years.  Erb’s road to victory began with some great games during qualifying.  Erb shot 225, 216, 236, 258, and 246 for 1142 (+142) after 5 games.  Erb sat in 6th place on the leaderboard, trailing the leader by just 61 pins entering match play.  The top 20 bowlers in Scratch advanced after qualifying.  We had a tie for the last spot at (+72).  Francis Vitelli won the rolloff and advanced in over Elizabeth Clement.  In Match Play, Erb turned on the jets to the top of the leaderboard.  Erb won all three of his matches and bowled a perfect game 300 during Game 8!  His amazing bowling propelled him into the tournament lead entering the stepladder final.  Erb ended up having a 124 pin lead on the field entering the stepladder.  In the final match, Erb took on #4 seed DJ Brown.  Brown was on a roll.  He attempted to walk the ladder….as he won the first 3 stepladder matches.  He shot games of 268, 230, and 243 to defeat #5 Matthew Bortz, #3 Jack Celmer, and #2 Andrew Dekowski.  The final match was Erb vs Brown.  This match was close to the end but Erb was able to stop the Brown train….as Erb shot 208 and defeated Brown, who shot 186.  Eric Erb won the top prize of a $200 scholarship and trophy for his victory.  He also won $12 in Scholarship for his 300, which he split with Daniel Althouse.

In Handicap, Kyle Vaughn captured his 2nd career PJBT title, his 1st ever Singles Title.  Vaughn’s last title came about 2 years ago in the Clearview Team Tournament in March 2015.  Vaughn made a run in the end….he started slow.  Vaughn entered the event with a 177 average and 20 pins handicap per game.  He shot scratch games of 227, 193, 226, 189 and only 138 for his 5th game.  Despite his last game, he still was in 9th place out of 14 advancers at 1073 (+73).  Before Match Play began, we had to break a 3-WAY TIE for the cut!  The first cut was +44 and 3 bowlers stood at that number.  After a 2-frame rolloff, Corey Rinda defeated Lauren Weber and Desmond Brown to advance into match play.  In Match Play, Vaughn went 3-0 with some strong games and advanced up the leaderboard into 2nd place entering the stepladder finals.  Vaughn only trailed tournament leader Nathan Hartman by 78 pins.  In the finals, Vaughn took on #4 seed Shania Jennings in the semi-final.  Jennings had won her 1st 2 matches to advance to the match with Vaughn.  This match came down the 10th frame.  Jennings left a split and gave Vaughn the chance to win with 2 strikes and count.  Vaughn got the two strikes and won the match 219-213.  Vaughn then advanced to the title match vs Nathan Hartman.  Hartman got off to a slow start and Vaughn took advantage.  In the end, Vaughn defeated Hartman 187-162 to take home the $200 top scholarship prize and plaque for his victory.

On this day, we also had some honor scores.  For the 2nd tournament in a row, Daniel Althouse shot 300 during qualifying.  Eric Erb followed up the honor train with a 300 in Match Play.  Both bowlers split the $24 300 Pot for $12 a piece.  In addition, this event was the first EVER in PJBT history that we had a 2-way tie in 1 division and a 3-way-tie in the other at the same time after qualifying.  That was quite interesting!  Due to a large amount of entries….this event saw the top 9 finishers in Scratch cash and the top 6 in Handicap.  Paid out over $1250 in scholarships!

Next Week:  PJBT rolls back into Hanover Bowling Centre for the first time in about 2 years for 2 events.  PJBT Singles at 10:30am and BuddiesProShop.com Adult Event at 12Noon.  Unlike last year’s 25 inch snowstorm that cancelled the events….we should be good for Sunday 1/15/17.