Schools add bowling to athletic repertories

It all starts with the rumbling sound of a 16-pound rainbow-colored bowling ball gliding across a neatly oiled wooden lane.

Then there’s the famous sound of the collision as the ball meets its destination, scattering the 10 pins across the lane and into the backdrop before it’s time to start over again.

Those are sounds reminiscent of a Friday night of fun in the Tri-parish area.

Now, they are the sounds of competition at work, as several high schools are gearing up for the new bowling seasons n the first-ever season for many teams in the Tri-parish area.

“I pushed it, I was really hoping for this,” South Lafourche bowling coach Kelly Adams said. “I wish we could have gotten it a few years earlier, but now that we’re here, we’re very excited.”

In total, nine Tri-parish high schools will be taking part in prep bowling this year on both the boy’s and girl’s level (Vandebilt Catholic, South Lafourche, Terrebonne, H.L. Bourgeois, Morgan City, Central Catholic, Berwick, Ellender and South Terrebonne).

The schools have all agreed to compete amongst one another, forming their own district, which will feature a 12-match regular season with a district champion set to be crowned for each gender.

Within that season is also an LHSAA-sponsored postseason that features a regional, bi-regional and state tournament.

The current local schools participating this year are greatly increased from last year when only a handful of schools (Vandebilt, Central Catholic, Morgan City and Berwick) had bowling.

That increased participation has enrollment numbers up across teams and participants excited about the progress the sport has made, according to one of Morgan City’s coaches, Tori Grizzaffi.

“We’re very excited about the growth in the sport,” Grizzaffi said. “And the students who are playing are also more excited because of the increased competition. We can play different schools now and just have more opportunities to play this sport we love.”

The 2011 bowling season officially got underway last Wednesday when the participating teams filled Creole Lanes and Bowl South for a jamboree.

A crowd of approximately 75 people packed each alley to show their support for their respective teams.

The atmosphere surrounding these events isn’t like that of football, basketball or any other “major” sporting event.

Players on opposing sides take part in friendly banter throughout the event and even encourage their opponents when they aren’t performing as well as they’d hope.

“This isn’t the same thing that you see with the so-called normal sports,” Central Catholic coach Bobby Cline said. “It’s a little more old-fashioned. It’s not the same as the sports like baseball and football. We take in a different group of kids and that’s what we’ve really worked hard to do.”

The push, according to Cline and other’s involved in the sport’s expansion locally is to give players not blessed with height, size and strength the opportunity to still represent their schools in athletic competition.

“We want to make sure every kid gets an opportunity to participate in an athletic program if they’d like to,” Cline said.

Vandebilt Catholic Athletics Director Laury Dupont agreed and said he hopes the sport continues to grow into the future.

“For all of these young men and women who can’t necessarily excel in all of the sports, this really is great for them,” Laury Dupont said. “It just gives every student more self esteem and more self-confidence.”

But don’t picture local bowling meets as a completely non-competitive event n these kids can bowl.

In the jamboree, Morgan City freshman Chandler Delaune recorded the high score for the boy’s rolling a 267 game.

On the girl’s side, South Lafourche’s Carly Callais had a 208 game.

Not bad for a bunch of newbie schools to the sport.

Bowling’s just getting started and everyone agrees they are looking forward to where the sport might be headed.

“This is awesome,” Cline said. “It really is amazing to see how far it’s come in such a short span of time. This is a great thing.”

H.L. Bourgeois’ Joni Leggett aims for a strike during last Wednesday’s bowling jamboree at Creole Lanes. The jamboree showcased the debut of bowling to several Tri-parish schools. CASEY GISCLAIR I TRI-PARISH TIMES