Conference USA Tournament Run Ends

NEW ORLEANS – Vanderbilt was eliminated from the Conference USA Tournament Friday afternoon at Colonial Lanes.

“Today was a frustrating day,” head coach John Williamson said. “We bowled well yesterday but didn’t today. This is probably the hardest tournament we’ll have to bowl all season. I felt like we figured things out too late in the best-of seven. In the postseason, you’re not going to advance if you don’t play well. We need to be better.”

The third-seeded Commodores dropped their first mega-match of the day to No. 7 seed Sam Houston State 2-0. Both the traditional and Baker matches were low scoring. The Bearkats won the traditional game by a score of 895-869. Vandy lost the 939-913 Baker match to Sam Houston.

The Dores fell to the contender’s bracket where they faced fourth-seeded Wichita State in an elimination match. Vanderbilt got off to a quick start with a 1,087-1,052 traditional game win. All five bowlers shot over 200. Isabel Allen led the way with a 236. Sydney Bohn bowled a 221. Alyssa Ballard and Kailee Channell registered respective scores of 215 and 210 pins. Victoria Varano added a score of 205.

The Commodores swept the first two Baker games and built a 33-pin advantage, but the Shockers took the next two games and grabbed a four-pin lead heading into the final 10 frames. Wichita State won the fifth game to send the mega-match to a best-of-seven tiebreaker. The final Baker score was 1,006-986.

In the tiebreaker, the Shockers won the first three games. Vanderbilt notched a win 215-184 win in Game 4, but Wichita State held on in Game 5 to move onto the Saturday’s play and eliminate the Dores from the tournament.

Qualifiers for the NCAA Bowling Tournament will be announced at the National Collegiate Bowling Selection Show, which will be streamed on NCAA.com Wednesday at 3 p.m. CT.