Submitted Article
The Lady Pirates traveled to Hilltop Lanes & Events in Dodge on February 4 to take part in the B-4 Districts.
The Pirates bowled the next day on the 5th of February for the boys’ side.
Lady Pirates were missing a bowler due to illness and would have the challenge of now being two short instead of one.
The Lady Pirates would bowl three regular games to try to make it to state as individuals, and then after that, they would be put into a bracket to battle as a team to try to earn their way to state.
There are two chances to get to state, as an individual or as a whole team, but the best chance would be for one of the Lady Pirates to go to state as an individual because the team was short those two bowlers.
The Lady Pirates started off strong with a 407 in the first game and tried to keep the pace with a 388 and 381, which put them at a total of 1,176, which is not bad for only having three bowlers. However, this did put the Lady Pirates in 6th place out of 6 teams.
Leading the way were the Wayne Lady Blue Devils and Howells-Dodge Lady Jaguars in 1st and 2nd, respectively, with a bye in the first round of the bracket.
Hartington-Newcastle Lady Wildcats would get 3rd and face off with the Lady Pirates to see who will face off with Howells-Dodge. Wayne would wait to see which team from the TC Lady Thunder in 4th and Norfolk Catholic Lady Knights in 5th would be.
The Lady Wildcats did not have much trouble with the Lady Pirates because we were short those two bowlers and won the first three matches 89-59, 110-82, and 102-59 in the best of 3 out of 5 bakers. The Lady Knight would fall to the Lady Thunder, pushing the match to all 5 with a final score of 3-2. The next round would be the Lady Blue Devils versus the Lady Thunder, which again took all 5 bakers to get a winner, with the Devils coming out on top with a score of 3-2. The Lady Jaguars took out the Lady Wildcats 3-0.
The final bakers’ series would be between the Lady Blue Devils and Lady Jaguars, which went to a full set as well, with the Lady Blue Devils having to come from behind 2-1 to win 3-2, taking the last two games. Lady Blue Devils will represent District B-4 in state team competition.
Back to the individual competition to see who is going to state.
Each district will send the top five with no ties, so that means if there is a tie for 5th place, there will be a sudden death roll-off to see who is going and who is not.
This did not happen to one of the Lady Pirates, but it did happen at the competition, so the Lady Pirates got to learn what is to happen if it ever happens to one of them.
Madilyn Janke from Wayne would get the choice of whether to go first or second with a single ball roll-off over Annemarie Slaughter from Howells-Dodge per the rules according to NSAA. Janke had a seven count, but it was not enough to hold off Slaughter, who threw an eight count, which means Annemarie had punched her ticket to state individuals for Class B in dramatic fashion.
The closest Lady Pirate was Natalee Gatz with a 429, about 20 pins short of qualifying for state. Following close behind was Lucea Miller with a 420, which placed her 11th, just outside of medaling by 8 pins.
This is the end of the 2024-2025 season for the Lady Pirates with a final record of 0-17.
Pirate District Bowling
The Pirates head down the next morning for their chance to try to make it to state.
The NSAA allowed the Pirates to take part in only the individual side and would have to forfeit when the team part would start, which would be impossible with only having two bowlers there. The Pirates would start off slow with only a 206.
They grabbed another 50 pins in the second game with 258 and improved another 80 pins with a 331 in the last game. Total pins would add up to 795, which is not anywhere close to the rest of the teams. None of the Pirates would make it to state with the low scores that were thrown.
After the three games, the Wayne Blue Devils were leading by almost 300 pins, followed by the Hartington-Newcastle Wildcats being the other team that got a first-round bye. The Pirates would forfeit at this point, which means that the Howells-Dodge Jaguars would also get a bye. The only match to start is Norfolk Catholic Knights versus TC Thunder. The Knights won 3-1 over the Thunder. So round two would be between Blue Devils versus Knights and Jaguars versus Wildcats. Blue Devils won 3-0, and Wildcats would need to barely get by the Jaguars 3-2. Finals would have the Blue Devils over the Wildcats 3-1. Just like the Lady Pirates, the Baker’s series Pirates had to forfeit; we would count it as their season record, so they finish the year 0-18.
This wrapped up the season for the Pirates’ Bowling of 2024-2025.
This has been Head Coach Leonard Risinger signing off for the year, until next year.