SATURDAY RECAP-- APRIL 16, 2011
Maryland Eastern Shore took home the crown at the 2011 NCAA Women's Bowling Championships, defeating Vanderbilt, 4-2 at Skore Lanes in Taylor, Mich. Saturday. The Lady Hawks rebounded from a two-games-to-one deficit to win three straight games and the match.
UMES grabbed the early lead with a 215-197 win in the opening game but Vanderbilt answered with a 193-164 win in game two. The Commodores struck in each of the first six frames en route to a 248-201 win in game three. The Lady Hawks roared back with a 30-pin win for the equalizer in game four and it became a best-of-three for the national title.
The Lady Hawks re-gained the lead with a commanding 235-166 victory in the fifth game, inching UMES closer to its second national championship. The sixth game was a back-and-forth affair all the way to the final frame when a Vanderbilt open frame opened the door for UMES. Lady Hawk anchor Maria Rodriguez marked 29 in the 10th to put it away.
To qualify for the championship match, both teams needed to win a pair of matches against undefeated and higher-seeded teams earlier in the bracket. Each did.
UMES knocked-out top seed Fairleigh Dickinson with a 4-2 win Saturday morning, following-up a 4-1 win in Friday's final round in the double-elimination bracket. VU duplicated its Friday afternoon win over second-seeded Nebraska with 4-1 victories on each occasion to advance to the championship.
Saturday's championship will air on ESPN Sunday afternoon beginning at 2:30 p.m. Eastern time.
FRIDAY RECAP-- APRIL 15, 2011
Day two highlights
The top four seeded teams all remain alive with one loss heading into the final day of the 2011 NCAA Women's Bowling Championship at Skore Lanes in Taylor, Mich. The four teams represent the last four NCAA champions in the sport and are the only schools to win the crown since the tournament began in 2004.
Top-seeded Fairleigh Dickinson and second-seeded Nebraska advanced through the winner's bracket in their first two matches while Maryland Eastern Shore and Vanderbilt had to fight back through elimination matches. The day wasn't without its drama, as FDU had to fend off Vanderbilt in an epic second-round match that went to a tiebreaker. The 192-192 tie in the first game set the tone for this match. After the Commodores posted wins in each of the next two games, defending NCAA-champ FDU answered with three straight wins. VU's 199-184 win in the seventh game left the teams each with 3.5 games and forcing a tiebreaker. In the five-frame roll-off, FDU squeaked by with a 107-105 win to advance.
Saturday's matches include FDU (2010 NCAA champ) against UMES (2008) with the other semifinal pitting Nebraska (2009) against Vanderbilt (2007). Nebraska won it all the last time the championships were held in the Detroit area. Semifinals begin at 10:40 a.m. on Saturday with the championship set for 3:40 p.m. A tape-delayed broadcast of the final round can be seen on ESPN on Sun., April 17 at 2:30 p.m.
THURSDAY QUALIFYING ROUND RECAP-- APRIL 14, 2011
Day one highlights
Defending-champion Fairleigh Dickinson leads the field of eight teams after the qualifying rounds of the 2011 NCAA Women's Bowling Championship at Skore Lanes in Taylor, Mich. The three-day tourney began Thursday with all eight teams playing each other to determine seeds for Friday's bracketed double-elimination Baker-format competition.
The Knights went 6-1 on the day to grab the top seed for Friday. FDU's lone loss came at the hands of Maryland Eastern Shore, who grabbed a slim 50-pin win the third round. Two rounds earlier, UMES recorded a new school record with its performance in round two, bowling a blistering 1,240, easily the highest single-game team total of the day. The match was highlighted by Kristina Frahm’s 279, while all five UMES players shot at least 216 in the win. Frahm's 226 average sets the pace for the field and her second-round score would go down as the highest individual score of the day, tied with Arkansas State's Amanda Labossiere.
Nebraska will be the second seed after a 5-2 record on day one followed by third-seeded UMES, who finished the qualifying round at 4-3. Three schools tied with 3-4 records with Vanderbilt grabbing the fourth seed based on tie-breakers with Central Missouri and Arkansas State in the fifth and sixth spots, respectively. The two programs in their first-ever NCAA Championships-- Sam Houston State and Kutztown-- grabbed the final two spots in the bracket.
The competition cranks back up Friday as the teams advance through the bracket in the hopes of qualifying for Saturday's nationally- televised championship pairing. Action gets underway at 9:50 a.m. and continues throughout the day. Follow
updates of the tournament here and watch live webcasts of Friday's matches
here.
The final two teams alive in the bracket will square-off Saturday afternoon at 3:40 p.m. The final will be a tape-delayed broadcast on ESPN on Sunday at 2:30 p.m. Eastern time.
