Jan. 15, 2017
JONESBORO, AR—Two days of the bowling blahs vanished Sunday for Vanderbilt’s Commodores as they defeated a trio of Top 10 teams to claim third place at the Mid-Winter Classic. It was easily Vandy’s best Sunday performance of the year.
Vanderbilt used a rotation of Jordan Newham, Adel Wahner, Kristin Quah, Giselle Poss and Maria Bulanova the entire way — one senior, two sophomores and two freshmen. With the encouraging day, Vandy ended the tournament with a 9-4 worksheet that included five Top 10 victories.
“I think the difference was that we executed much better today,” said Coach John Williamson. “When you make quality shots you apply pressure. The first two days we were spraying it around but today with better execution our spares were easier and we filled more frames.
“This was the first time in a long time when I felt we were in control the entire day,” Williamson continued. “When you get three good wins, everyone contributes something. Maria made some big shots in the tenth frames; G (Giselle) and Kristin were solid and Jordan and Adel did a good job at the top. We had some good things happen here and I hope we can take the momentum with us.”
The Commodores signaled they might sing a different and better tune from the start, blowing out tenth-ranked Maryland-Eastern Shore, 4-0, in a game that paired the fifth and sixth-seeded teams. One of those games ended with seven straight Black and Gold strikes.
That win set up an interesting match with third-ranked and host Arkansas State. After spotting ASU the first game, Vandy rattled off three straight Baker wins and narrowly missed winning the best-of-seven in five games, losing 189-179 in Game 5.
The hosts battled back to tie the match, setting up Game 7 for the right to play in the consolation game. Strikes by Quah, Poss and Bulanova in the eighth, ninth and tenth were the difference in a 212-184 win that allowed Vandy to advance to face fifth-ranked Stephen F. Austin.
This proved to be a back and forth affair in which teams rotated wins and tied the third game. The defending national champions grabbed a 3.5-2.5 lead before VU rallied to take Game 7 by a large margin to set up a modified Baker tiebreaker (teams bowl just five frames, each bowler handles one frame). Vanderbilt won, 98-71, to earn the victory.
Nebraska defeated McKendree, 4-2, to win the tournament title.
It will be a short week on campus as the ‘Dores leave Thursday for the Kutztown Invitational in Reading, Pa., next weekend.
