Juan Coston Jr. last bowler standing to capture BR Singles title

BATON ROUGE, LA – Have to admit, it’s pretty amazing. A couple of weeks ago, he was 10 pins shy of the city record at All-Star Lanes.

Sunday, Juan Coston, Jr., was the last bowler standing in a field of 521 to win the top prize of $3,809 in the December BR Singles event at Circle Bowl.

Coston beat Houston bowler Ryan Holland, 440-381 in the final two-game match to capture the top prize. Coston entered with a current average of 230 and averaged 241 for his 16 games. Holland, a 222 average bowler, averaged 215 for his 16 games of bowling and collected $1,904.50 for second.

It was a good tourney for local bowlers with five of the top eight spot and the two semifinals have to be given a lot of congratulations.

Her father, and her mother, are used to being in the top of events like this, but Summer Juneau continues to show she is going to be one to keep an eye on. She came in with a 196 average and posted 207 for the tournament, losing to Holland in her semifinal match, 355-324. Joseph Hendrick III of Baton Rouge averaged 186 off a 167 entering average and lost to Coston, 510-434, in that semi. Both picked up nice checks of $799.89.

Gregory Snee and Ryan White were the two local quarterfinalists cashing for $533.26, while Cameron Bennett of Alexandria, Brek Cupp and Daniel Nelson of New Orleans, Billy King of Lake Charles and Steve Burger of Baton Rouge got to the round of 16 to earn $304.72.

Justin Bui had the first 21 strikes in his qualifying and easily made the first day cut. Jacob Garretson also had a 300 game along the way.

In the Friday night sweeper, it was a case of building a big lead and hanging on for the $450 top prize as Marshall Morrison opened with games of 268, 268 and 245 for a fairly comfortable lead. Morrison threw 208 in the final game to finish at 989, but Bui, after games of 258, 206, 245 put a 279 on the board and finished just one pin behind in second at 988. Still it was a $300 payday for Bui.

Jessie Thibodaux posted 932 to earn $190 for third, while Steve Burger posted 925 for fourth ($130) and BR runner-up Holland had 887 for $90 and fifth place.

The next BR tournament is set for March.

Bowling on TV

Bowler’s Journal put out a spread on the television broadcasts for the 2017-18 contract season between Dec. 10 (this Sunday) and Oct. 31, 2018 and it is pretty extensive and impressive.

The events through Jan. 7 on ESPN will be from the recently completed World Series of Bowling in Reno which were possibly seen live on the Watch ESPN app. That including the PBA World Championship, the final major of 2017 on Sunday, Dec. 31, at noon.

The schedule resumes with the CP3 PBA Celebrity Invitational which moves to Christ Paul’s new NBA playing home of Houston. Taped last week, that show airs on Feb. 4 before three straight weeks of live bowling with the Tournament of Champions, the 60th Anniversary Classic and the PBA Players Championship.

The USBC Masters moves to April this year prior to the start of the PBA League.

CBSSN’s coverage will begin April 24 with the Intercollegiate shows and their coverage will include the USBC Queens (May 22), the two U.S. Opens (June 30, Oct. 31) and this year five other PWBA Tour stops that will be decided at the bowling center the tournament started in.

It’s ambitious schedule for both networks, but will give bowling fans a good variety of shows that hopefully will be fun and entertaining. Reports are the shows from Reno will have lots of surprises.

Honor roll notes

More great stuff on the lanes over the last couple of weeks topped by the 809 (275) by Eric White and Gregory Snee with another 300 and an 803 set. TJ Wheeler, D’Lara Carter and Wiley Williams had 300 games, as did Duke Koontz and Jacob Garretson.

Three ladies posted 700 sets — Tiffany Blackwell 715 (268); Mary Mansur 710 (279) and Stacy Cox 701 (264). Hannah Grather in the youth leagues posted 709 and George Smith had 705 in the senior leagues.

Craig Santangelo posted a 298 game and Chad Conard 299 in near misses to the 300 scoring parade.

Still waiting on city tournament results to become official and once we get those we will pass them along. Back with our final column of 2017 on Dec. 19. Until then, good luck and good bowling.