Huntley Girls Bowling Makes Adjustments, Falls Short

The Huntley girls bowling program has only been existence for two seasons and coach Sandra Spear knows her team will continue to experience some growing pains as their 2010-2011 campaign unfolds.

One such example was on display Monday in Huntley's dual meet against Glenbard East at Brunswick Zone in Glendale Heights. The Red Raiders, playing on very unfamiliar lanes, got off to a slow start and fell behind by 220 pins (869-649) in their first game. Facing such a large margin on foreign lanes and with a team average hovering around 730-750, Huntley knew they were on the verge of a long afternoon.

"Our first game did not go so well," said Spear after Huntley fell to Glenbard East 2751-2143. "Our girls did not play their best. It usually takes a while to get used to these lanes because the Brunswick Zones have a much slicker surface. It's hard for the girls because our surface is much drier, so it takes them about a game to adjust.

"We bowled about 100 pins lower than [our average]," said Spear of the first game, "and that hurts."

For such a young and relatively inexperienced team to be expected to adjust so quickly and bowl the type of game required to knock off the Rams on their home lanes might be more than can be reasonably expected from the Red Raiders. Despite the slow start, Spear was pleased with the adjustments her girls made after that first game. 

Huntley's team total improved to a 762 in the second game, an amount well above the team's season average. The Red Raiders were led by a 221 from Amy Antezak in the second game. Although Antezak was sick leading up to the match against Glenbard East, she managed to pull through and bowl a 138, 221, 216 on the afternoon.

Antezak's performance was supported by Nikki DeMarco, who bowled a 134, 172, 158 in her three games. Tiffany Tanski added a 133, 151, 121 while Ashley Lawler added a 132, 123, 146 for Huntley.

"I'm really pleased. I did well for these lanes," DeMarco said. "Usually, the oil pattern messes me up a little, but I got used to it really fast [because] I moved a few boards over so that my ball hugged a little more."

Although Huntley has dropped their first two matches of the season heading into Wednesday's meet against South Elgin at Bowl-Hi Lanes, the focus of the team at this point is to create a positive environment and continue to try to score above their season average. The Red Raiders managed to accomplish the latter in their second game, while performing the former throughout the match.

"I'm really happy, even though we lost," DeMarco said. "We were upbeat and happy for each other throughout the game, so I'm happy with it."

Moving forward, Huntley knows they will continue to face tricky surfaces like the plastic surface installed at the Brunswick Zones. The shaky first game is something Spear knows her team must eliminate and, both in practice and in future preparation for matches, becoming more consistent is a trait the Red Raiders will continue to develop.

"Well this is our first away meet at a different lane and most of [the team] haven't had this experience," Spear said. "They get 15 minutes of practice at the beginning, I try to help them adjust as much as possible, but the more you bowl, the better you get. So you can see most of their games go up on average and that's kind of what we expect."