PCHS Bowling team returns to action following the holiday break

By: Rhonda Hutchison

On January 6th, the Pendleton County bowlers were back in action at Walt's Center Lanes in Newport competing in the 2024 Covington Catholic Invitational tournament. 

There were 17 boys teams and 12 girls teams competing in the invitational from various parts of Kentucky. The format of this tournament was two regulation games (five bowlers each team total pins) for seeding then head to head matches with the winner of two out of three baker games moving on. The competition in both boy/girl divisions was fierce.

Pendleton County went into the seeding round with nothing but pin counts in their vision. Both the Ladycats and the Wildcats seeded fourth in their division. The Ladycats had 1413 pins, 285 pins from first and the Wildcats had 1908 pins, 79 pins from first seed. Because of their fourth place seeding, the Ladycats had a bye the first round. In the second round the Ladycats came up against their long time rival Boone County. Over the past several weeks this young Ladycat team has continued to fight and to improve their standings in the region. This match was no exception. The Ladycats were hungry to take down their long time rival and move on in the competition. They took the first baker game in the match only to have Boone take the second. After a brief pep talk from Coach Brewer, the Ladycats came out roaring. By the end of the match the Ladycats stood on top beating Boone 163 to 137 moving them on to the final four. In the next round the Ladycats had their hands full with Lexington-Lafayette who had seeded first. The Ladycats faltered in the first baker game and lost 123 to 148 With fight in their eyes the Ladycats came out ready to show what they were made of. Once the game started the Ladycats never looked back and dominated the lanes. They took the lead from the first frame and kept it thru the tenth to win 158 to 133. The Ladycats stayed within reach of Lexington Lafayette for the first five frames but were unable to string any strikes thus losing the third game 153 to 115 eliminating them from the tournament.

With the Wildcats being last years champs, everyone was out to take them down. The Wildcats first match was against Highlands. Coming out on top to move to the final eight the Wildcats took down Highlands in three games (201-183 won, 191-198 lost, 203-173 won). In this round the Wildcats went up against Cooper A. In the first baker the boys took the win 237-212: however, Cooper A came back to take the second baker 206-245. The Wildcats continued to bowl well but were unable to overcome Cooper A who had 10 out of 12 possible strikes in the third game taking the game and match win (184-242) eliminating the Cats. 

An all tournament team was selected from both the boys and girls divisions. The top six scoring bowlers, from the 2 seeding games, earned a place on the team. Ladycat Kree Brewer earned her way onto the girls team as the #1 girls bowler for the tournament. Kree bowled a 223 the first game and a 238 the second for a total pin count of 461, the top score for the girls division. Bowlers representing Pendleton were: Bradley Brann, Braden Brann, Karson Enzweiler, Chance Enzweiler, Adam Straus, Colton Webster, Leroy Bryant, Kyan Brewer, Aliyah Webster, Maddie Crawford, Dara Morton, Brooklyn Wrobleski, Emma Lee Chappell, Kree Brewer.