Charles City bowlers take second and Middle School State Tournament

By John Burbridge sports@charlescitypress.com

Perfect Games bowling alley in Ames didn’t quite provide the perfect bowling conditions.

Or at least not the type preferred by a quartet of Charles City bowlers competing at the Iowa Middle School State Bowling Championships on March 4.

“They’re use to bowling here (at Comet Bowl) on dry wooden lanes,” said Doug Bohlen, the Charles City High School bowling coach, who fielded a team consisting of Lilly Usher, Colton Crooks, Tino Tamayo and grandson Cael Bohlen for the tournament.

“Down there, they were wet.”

As a result, the Charles City team started out poorly.

“We just had to slow the ball down to get it to hook more,” Bohlen said. “By the third game, they caught on and started bowling much better.”

But a team representing Waverly-Shell Rock had already built a substantial lead in the Coed Division.

“But they were looking over at our scores in the final game,” Bohlen said. “They knew we were gaining on them.”

Getting on a late roll was not enough for Charles City. Despite Cael Bohlen’s team-high 488 series which was complemented with Crooks’s 477, Tamayo’s 471 and Usher’s 373 — 1,809 total — W-SR kept enough distance with an 1,876 total for first place.

W-SR was led by Lane Shears, who paced the division’s individual bowlers with a 555 series.

Patrick Goetz’s 496 series was the second-best individual score as his led Keokuk Middle School, which finished a distant third behind Charles City.

Cael Bohlen’s series was the third-best among individuals.

Charles City’s team consisted of members from the Charles City Youth Bowling Program.

Recently, the program held its annual Higher Education Tournament where Tamayo won the first-place $450 scholarship prize after leading the Boys 12-18 division with a handicapped 753 series.