High School Bowling
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Lewiston High School Wins State Title
March 6, 2010, Lewiston High School captured the State Team Bowling Title Saturday with a 3-2 Win over Skowhegan High School. Match play began with quarterfinal action with Waterville defeating Nokomis 3-0, Winslow beat Bangor High 3-0, Skowhegan defeated Cony High School 3-1, and Lewiston took a 3-0 win over Hermon High School.
In the semifinals, Skowhegan, the #1 seed from the Northern region, defeated Winslow 3-1. In the other semifinal, Lewiston defeated the Southern Region champion Waterville 3-1 in what was a rematch of the regional finals, where Waterville defeated Lewiston.
In the Championship match, Lewiston jumped out to a 1-0 lead with a 236-184 win over Skowhegan in the best of five series. Skowhegan took game two 207-150. Lewiston won game three 162-154 before Skowhegan evened the series at two a piece with a 194 -186 win. Lewiston threw a championship high 237 game to claim the state title. Skowhegan scored a 203 in the final game.
Devils Bowl Over Competition
By Kevin Mills, Staff Writer – Sun Journal
Mar 17, 2010 12:00 am
What expectations Jeff
Marcotte had for his bowling team weren't lofty ones.
After struggling through the regular season and winning just one game in the
state tournament qualifying, the Lewiston High School bowling coach entered the
state championships with a heavy dose of realism.
"We weren't going to win," he said. "For what we'd
showed all season long, I thought if we make it to the semifinals or get through
the first round, things can happen, but I wasn't expecting it. They just hadn't
showed me anything at that point."
Well, something happened on the way to a third state
championship in the last six years for the Blue Devils. A team that likely
wouldn't became a team that could and did. It was a stunning victory at
Lewiston's Sparetime Recreation on Saturday, March 7.
"I would never have guessed this in a million years,"
said Marcotte. "It was a Cinderella story. None of the other schools thought we
would do it. They all thought we'd be a pushover because of what happened during
the season. We got beat pretty handily in some matches because we weren't able
to pick up spares. For some reason, in the championship match, they started to
gel."
Lewiston had reached the semifinal round the last two
years in the state tournament. Those finishes came after winning the state
titles back-to-back in 2005 and 2006 and finishing runner-up in 2007. This year,
Marcotte had just two regulars back, his youngest son Cam Marcotte, a junior,
and sophomore Tim Leeman. The rest of the state championship squad included
juniors Kyle Fenderson, Alex Gagne, Tyler Saucier and Brian Bickford.
"They were actually the only two bowlers that had any
high school bowling experience," said Marcotte. "The rest of the team bowled in
the youth league on Saturdays but some of them never bowled at all. So we had a
real young and inexperienced team."
Lewiston is one of a handful of varsity bowling teams
in the state. They compete in the Southern Division, which had six teams,
including clubs like Cony, Lawrence, Winslow and Waterville while there are nine
teams in the North, most from the Greater Bangor area. Many of the teams are
still club programs.
Lewiston typically practices on Tuesdays and
Wednesdays and bowls on Thursday nights. The season runs from late November to
the tourney in March. During that time, the Blue Devils began to show progress.
"We had to breakdown everybody, going back to basics
and build from there," said Marcotte, who is assisted by his son Brandon, who
was on both state title teams for Lewiston. "Our first three bowlers, their
averages were about 100 or maybe 120. At the end of the season, one was 140 and
the others were 160 or 170. We built them up."
Still the team had its inconsistency. In the state
tourney, the teams bowl under the Baker Format, in which five players from each
team rotate to bowl two out of the 10 frames. Teams typically played one of
these games per week, but Lewiston had struggled, especially in a tournament
over the Christmas break.
"We finished dead last," said Marcotte. "We struggled all year in the
Baker games. We won one game out of six to finish last."
His team practiced that format leading up to the
tournament, but the Blue Devils faced other obstacles. The team was going to be
shorthanded in the qualifier because Cam Marcotte, the team's top bowler, was
going to be away on a school marketing project. Another bowler thought he might
not be able to compete but arrived just in time for the match.
"We lost the first two games against Waterville and we
came back to win the third," said Marcotte. "We almost took the fourth, but we
finished as the third seed only because Cony lost all four of its games and we
had won one."
That was still a major step for Lewiston. When the
team got down early, Marcotte told them he expected a much better showing from
his team, especially on their home sight. The team began to respond, including
two relative newcomers that had to fill in at the head of the rotation. Gagne
and Fenderson were tossed into the fire when the team was shorthanded but helped
the team's cause.
"We had to scramble to even field a team," said
Marcotte. "I only had two other bowlers that we could use, and they were both JV
bowlers. I hadn't had them bowl with us for two weeks because we didn't want to
carry the extra bowlers. To get the production out of those two got the team
fired up."
A few days later in the state tourney, the Blue Devils
continued to show that spirit. Marcotte told the kids they couldn't have the
slow start it had a few days prior in the qualifier.
"They took it from there, and they just bowled
phenomenal," said Marcotte. "They rose to the occasion. They got fired up. They
were screaming and hollering. Usually they goof off in between frames. They were
all focused. Every one of them was focused and took it one shot at a time."
Lewiston beat Hermon with games of 200, 183 and 234 to
sweep the best-of-five. In the next round, the Blue Devils beat Waterville, the
team it lost to in the qualifier. Lewiston won in four games with victorious
scores of 170, 158 and 186.
In the championship match against heavily-favored
Skowhegan, it was a nail-biter. Lewiston won the first game but the teams traded
wins until the decisive fifth game. The Blue Devils needed the high score of the
tourney with a 237-203 win. Marcotte's three strikes in the 10th frame helped
seal the victory.
"It went back and forth the whole time," said Marcotte.
"It was ironic because we were on Lane 5 and 6 and each one of us had won our
game on Lane 5."
One of Lewiston's problems all year had been a domino effect. When one
player made a mistake or was struggling, the rest of the team would follow. That
didn't happen in the state tourney. The players rallied around each other and
picked one another up when it mattered.
"One would get down because he missed and then the
rest would just follow him," said Marcotte, who has the entire team returning
with the addition of some promising young bowlers coming up. "We didn't do that
this time. I told them that if somebody got down, the rest of them had to pick
him up. They were fired up the whole time. They were on each bowler to get them
fired up and keep them pumped up."
Cancellation Policy: If any one of the schools listed below cancels school or, after school activities, then high school bowling activities are cancelled for that day for all schools.
| Bangor | Hampden Academy |
| Brewer | Hermon |
| Bucksport | Orono |