After years of requests by parents and students, North Royalton High School is fielding a Bowling Team for the first time.
The team is competing in the National Conference of the Suburban League.
For those of you who do not know, bowling teams are made up of separate teams of boys and girls. Each match is made up of teams bowling two individual ten-frame games (with five bowlers on a team) and three so-called baker games. A baker game has a line-up of five team members each bowling two frames out of the 10. (1-6, 2-7, 3-8, 4-9 and 5-10). This brings the team element into bowling. The winner of the match is based on total pinfall.
If you think bowling at the High School level would be boring to play or watch, you are so wrong. There’s lots of cheering, lots of encouragement and more importantly, lots of fun.
Starting a sports team and competing in the first year is a challenge at any level. Throw in the fact that North Royalton is a ‘club team’. That means the team is self-funded.
Consider some of the challenges the Bears face this year. Of the 14 bowlers on the team (11 boys and 3 girls), everyone had to get a physical, not everyone had their own bowling ball or bowling shoes, the team has to carpool to get to matches, they have to buy their uniforms and they have to pay a reduced rate for practice time at their home lanes, which is Seven Hills Lanes on Broadview Road. There are no bowling alleys in North Royalton.
Coaching the Bears in this inaugural season is Ed Boduszek.
Ed says the kids are ‘super excited’ to be on a team and competing in a sport. “I want to see personal improvement from them this year and I want them to have fun. I think it’s a great experience for them and if they can show some improvement, everything else will come together”.
Boduszek is not at all discouraged as he puts together the bowling program at North Royalton. “I’ve talked with other bowling coaches in the Suburban League and they got started exactly the same way we are doing it. Once we get our core group of kids established and transportation issues worked out, I think our program will take off”.
The night that I watched the North Royalton Bowling team on the lanes against Wadsworth, there were nine bowlers on the lanes for the Bears. The nine were Justin Franczak, Andrew Smith, Andrew Seifert, Jimmy O’Brien, Casey Boduszek, Sydney Liptak, Joey Sbatella, Vince Fink and Kyle Papenfuss.
There are two reasons why North Royalton High School Athletic Director Bo Kuntz permitted the bowling team to form.
“Bo told me that there is college scholarship money available for those involved in individual sports (bowling, cross country, track, golf, gymnastics). Plus, the addition of bowling allows more students to get involved in the athletic experience in High School” said Boduszek.
The North Royalton Bowling team will have a number of fund-raisers in the months ahead as a way to establish themselves. Any help you can give will be considered a ‘strike’ by the team.

By JOE JASTRZEMSKI
Contributing Writer