A week after being swept by “The Four Scoresmen,” my team executed a sweep of our own against “Fantastic Four,” with “leftykev” supporting me in the second game with a 255 to hold off a good game (258) by “VFF57.” A check of the standings now finds “Size 11’s” in a tie in points for 4th place with “4 Marksmen,” with “Pretty Much Average” holding a five-point lead on “Where’s My Team?” at the top.

I felt well enough to go to the lanes today to bowl my make-up set for the virtual league this week. I didn’t bring my usual note sheet, so there’s no BowlSK for this set, but here’s a summary of what happened:

Game 1: 216; missed a 10 pin to start, but had a 4-bagger starting in the 4th frame

Game 2: 223; another single-pin miss (7) to start, and sandwiched a split between a 5-bagger (starting in 2nd frame) and a double. Closed out /X

Game 3: 202; thought I was running out of gas b/c I had 2 more single-pin misses (a 3 and a 7), but recovered w/ a 4-bagger from the 7th that I couldn’t fill in the 10th w/ at least a spare (got only one on a double-wood filling the 10th)

Series: 641…pretty solid effort, especially for someone barely recovering from an illness. 🙂

For the benefit of those who may be looking for a recap post tomorrow night or later in the week, my league has decided to postpone tomorrow night’s bowling because of the expected snowfall in the Brockton area. We will be bowling against the same teams on the 17th, meaning “Butz-N-Gutz” will be my team’s opponents.

My virtual league team suffered a setback last week at the hands of “The Four Scoresmen,” a team that includes “cgeorg” (who happens to be BowlSK’s webmaster), getting swept by said opponent. Although two of the three games ended up close, a major factor was the performance of “desertdog71,” who was over his average in all three games, and well over in two of them. The updated standings find my team holding down 8th place. At the top of the standings, “Pretty Much Average” hold a three-point lead on “Fantastic Four.”

I’ve already noted that my team only took one point this week, but “Double D” won all of their points, so we slipped into last place in the second half, a point and a half behind “Foxy SRS.” “The Generations” currently hold a two-point lead on “The Dynasty,” “The Mustangs,” and “Warren’s Girls” at the top of the standings. Next week won’t be easy for my team, as we’re scheduled against “Butz-N-Gutz.”

My Week 22 bowling, frame-by-frame (Link to series on BowlSK)

I took a warm-up game on the “Main Street” pattern with the newly-dulled-down Hy-Road, and, liking what I saw from my warm-up game, I decided to go with the ball tonight, and that and finally getting somewhat adjusted to the pattern got me more or less back on track, although my first two games didn’t necessarily show it. It was the last game where it finally came together, a one-open 225. If I have more games like that one on this pattern, I should be back to being dangerous.

Result: 171-181-225=577
Average (66 games): 188
Average for last 9 games: 182
Next week’s AVG+1 score: 573

Team was still only able to take a single point. I could’ve earned a split of the points in the third game with the first two in the 10th, but that was derailed by a first-ball “shaker” 7 pin. Of my teammates, Eileen and Carl gave me the most support tonight, as both had all three games over their respective averages.

“Size 11’s” got back on track last week, losing only the third game to “Drunken Masters,” a team that includes a couple of chat buddies (“MikeHL” and “lmfcoa”), for another 5/7 week. As a result, we now sit in a three-way tie in points for third place with “Fantastic Four” and the aforementioned “Drunken Masters.” “4 Marksmen” now hold a one-point lead on “Pretty Much Average” at the top of the virtual league standings. Individually, “Joe P.” of “Hambones” had a 300 game in the league he submits from…I’ve congratulated him on the forums.

If you’re wondering why I don’t announce the week’s opposition in the virtual league, it’s because I don’t really know, with the league wishing to keep the schedule unannounced so that bowlers in the league are free to post their scores publicly in the forums without giving their opposition an idea of what they need to win.

This update is a week late, but I’ve had to deal with another Internet connection outage since I last bowled and just plain forgot to look for the standings when my service was restored.

Both my team and “Double D” took a point each, so we remain a point ahead of them out of the league’s cellar. “The Dynasty” and “The Generations” are currently tied at the top, with “Butz-N-Gutz” sitting 2 points behind the pace in third. The opposition tonight will be “The Mustangs,” a team my team has done well against this season.

“Size 11’s,” my team, could only take 2/7 points from “4 Marksmen,” but we remain in a tie in points for 4th with “Fantastic Four,” and “4 Marksmen” now hold a two-point lead over “Drunken Masters.” Please note that averages for those bowlers with 9 games were recalculated, and the new averages seemed to be included in the handicap calculations.

Individually, “Russ I.” had a 300 game in the league he submits his scores from last week, so congratulations to him. 😀

My Week 21 bowling, frame-by-frame (Link to series on BowlSK)

I thought I played better tonight, at least to start, but it’s clear that more practice on the modified shot is in order. Transition usually forces me to move more inside, but with only one other real hook bowler on the right side, I had to move outside because of carry-down. A problem with the scorer in the third game also broke everyone’s rhythm because it forced a move to a different pair, though I found something on the new pair to salvage a 157.

Result: 201-168-157=526
Average (63 games): 188
Average for last 9 games: 188
Next week’s AVG+1 score: 583

Team only managed to take one point again, as none of us were very consistent.

My team may have only taken one point last week, but it was enough to stay out of the basement, as another team got swept for a second week in a row to start the second half. “The Dynasty” and “The Generations” have each taken 8 points to start the second half. My team faces the team immediately ahead of us, “The Wild Samoans,” this week.

Individually, Ed Godino III was the star last week, as he had a 276 game and a 728 set, both high on the week, and the 276 game is the second-best in the league this season.

My Week 20 bowling, frame-by-frame (Link to BowlSK)

As I note in the BowlSK comment, I was told after bowling tonight that the “High Street” pattern was modified by shortening it 2′, and the change caught me somewhat by surprise during warm-ups, as I noted my Hy-Road was useless and I had to switch to my High Voltage. I thought I was coping with it OK, but the shorter oil pattern length also had an effect on my spare game, as even my plastic ball hooked in the shorter oil. As a result, I missed more spares than I’ve been accustomed to recently.

Result: 193-169-178=540
Average (60 games): 189
Average for last 9 games: 194
Next week’s AVG+1 score: 605

Team took only one point (first game), even with Bobby Geddes absent, as our performances were spotty.

Things did look brighter in my virtual league, however, as my virtual team once again took 5 of 7, this time against a “real” team, Team 9, which included “General Pounder,” one of my friends from the BowlingFans.com chat. Two weeks in, the “Size 11’s” are tied in points for third place with “Drunken Masters,” two of the members of whom are “MikeHL” and “lmfcoa,” two newer chat buddies of mine. “4 Marksmen” and “Fantastic Four” are the two teams at the top of the current virtual league standings, both having only lost 2 points each after two weeks.

As I mentioned in the most recent league night recap, my team was one of three that failed to take points to open the second half, and the three teams that executed the sweeps could be considered “usual suspects”: “The Dynasty,” “The Generations,” and “The Mustangs.” The round-robin starts all over again this week with my team facing “VAKINC.”

According to the BC Mixed Virtual League blog (linked in the sidebar, click header to go to home page if you’re viewing the individual article), my team (named “Size 11’s”) took 5 of 7 points in the first week of a 12-week season against the “Bye” vacant team (under the rules of the league, a team must bowl its average or better to take points against the bye team). As a result, the early going finds us in a three-way tie for 3rd place. From the BowlingCommunity.com forums, I have two “real” teammates, “leftykev” from Spokane, WA, and “Don_Ebarb” from California, along with a 187 vacant score.

My Week 19 bowling, frame-by-frame (Link to series on BowlSK)

I’ve been making a habit of bowling 600 (this was the 4th week in a row I’ve done so), but last night was more of the consistent variety than the spectacular one. I chalk the night up to 2 things:

1. A 2&2 move I made on lane 38 after having 2 shots go basically through the nose, and finding something playing that line.
2. I’ve been applying what I do for my right side spares (keeping the target pin in my peripheral vision, drawing a line from my feet, though my target spot on the lane, and the pin, and trying to keep the ball on that line through the pushaway) to my left side, and I’ve noticed an improvement on that side, as well. In particular, I ran a spare percentage analysis on BowlSK again, and I am now over 50% on the season shooting the single 7 pin, which has been a trouble pin.

Result: 206-189-215=610
Average (57 games): 189
Average for last 9 games: 208
Next week’s AVG+1 score: 575

While I was having a decent night, my teammates weren’t necessarily (except for Carl, who also had 2 games over his average), and our opponents were enough over their average to take all 4 points. I didn’t feel so bad about the sweep, however, when I learned that 2 other teams also lost all of the points to start the second half.

My team finished tied for 7th place in the first half with “The Wild Samoans” at 34 points apiece (out of a possible 72). “Butz-N-Gutz” won the first-half title comfortably (4 points) over “The Mustangs.” The second half of the season gets underway for us against “The Generations” next week.

With most leagues at Westgate Lanes nearing the halfway point of the winter season, I will again use the new year as an unofficial halfway point and take a look at the best performances for both the men and the women to this point. Averages are based on a minimum of 36 games in the league.

Men

Average: 226 Harry Thibeault, Jr. (Westgate Mixed)
Series: 804 Danny Khuu (Westgate Mixed)
Game: 300 Derick Thibeault (2, Westgate Mixed), Jim Alfieri (Westgate Mixed), Danny Khuu (Westgate Mixed), Carl Nordstrom (Thursday Handicap Doubles), Troy Labrie (Coke Classic), Rich Fulton Jr. (Coke Classic)

Women

Average: 216 Sandi Litchfield (Westgate Mixed)
Series: 754 Tina Gannon (Coke Classic)
Game: 300 Tina Gannon (Coke Classic)

As my night was notable enough to post to my BowlSpace blog, my readers are hereby directed to this link. The post includes a standings update, as well. Note: The post has 2 links, indicated in yellow text.

As a follow-up note to last week, I asked Warren about his second game, and he did confirm that I missed a spare in the third frame of that game.

My Week 16 bowling, frame-by-frame (Link to BowlSK)

I was fairly pleased with the way I bowled tonight, but especially because of the second game, which was a miss of a double-wood leave shy of being in the 250s. At the end of the night, I was kicking myself for missing two single pins in the first game; if I had made just one of those, this would’ve been my best set of the season. I will take my best game of the season as a Christmas gift to myself, however.

Result: 192-243-200=635
Average (48 games): 186
Average for last 9 games: 194
Next week’s AVG+1 score: 585

Eileen and John pre-bowled for tonight, as they were traveling for the holiday, and, learning that all three games were over average for both of them, I was confident of taking some points. However, as Sue Young had a good night, and her husband Warren had a stellar night (711, with the first 10 in the second game before leaving a split for a 262, followed by a 250), we could only manage a split, with my team taking first game and total.