NU bowlers rally to earn top seed at NCAAs
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BY KEN HAMBLETON / Lincoln Journal Star
OMAHA — The Nebraska women’s bowling team doesn’t do cheers.
The Nebraska bowling team doesn’t do a lot of jumping around.
“We’re just kind of businesslike,” said captain Lindsay Baker, the only senior on the NU team.
BRACKET ONE
Match 1—No. 1 Nebraska (7,722) vs. No. 8 Central Missouri (7,202), 9:30 a.m.
Match 2—No. 5 Minnesota-Mankato (7,311) vs. No. 4 New Jersey City (7,332), 9:30 a.m.
Match 5—Winner Match 1 vs. Winner Match 2, 11:20 a.m.
Match 7—Loser Match 1 vs. Loser Match 2, 11:20 a.m.
Match 9—Loser Match 5 vs. Winner Match 7, 3:30 p.m.
Match 11—Winner Match 5 vs. Winner Match 9, 5:20 p.m.
BRACKET TWO
Match 3—No. 3 vs. Arkansas State (7,510) vs. No. 6 Sacred Heart (7,305), 9:30 a.m.
Match 4—No. 7 Maryland-Eastern Shore (7,277) vs. No. 2 Vanderbilt (7,680), 9:30 a.m.
Match 6—Winner Match 3 vs. Winner Match 4, 11:20 a.m.
Match 8—Loser Match 3 vs. Loser Match 4, 11:20 a.m.
Match 10—Loser Match 6 vs. Winner Match 8, 3:30 p.m.
Match 12—Winner Match 6 vs. Winner Match 10, 5:20 p.m.
SATURDAY’S SCHEDULE
Match 13—Match 11 rematch necessary if Winner Match 9 wins Match 11, Saturday, 4:30 p.m.
Match 14—Match 12 rematch necessary if Winner Match 10 wins Match 12, Saturday, 4:30 p.m.
CHAMPIONSHIP
Match 15—Bracket winners, Saturday, 7 p.m. (ESPNU)
“We’re quiet because all that cheerleading and singing during the bowling is distracting. We try to stay within ourselves and concentrate on the bowling.”
The Central Missouri bowlers sang throughout their matches. Arkansas State chanted the school name for every strike and New Jersey City had a cheer for every ball thrown.
Amid the din, Nebraska’s bowlers spoke quietly with their coaches and lightly tapped high-fives for strikes and spares.
Baker did show a short, reserved fist pump when she scored a strike and a spare to finish off the final game of the opening day of the NCAA Championships on Friday at Thunder Alley.
The Husker fans, who were in a majority of the 400 in attendance, cheered and jumped up and down on the aluminum bleachers.
“Put an ‘N’ on a red shirt in a great sports town, in a town that is known for great bowling and you get great fan support,” said Nebraska coach Bill Straub. “This is the biggest crowd, the best venue we’ve had for this tournament.” (Note that the NCAA made sure there was no alcohol served or observed anywhere in the facility.)
Nebraska provided plenty of reasons for the fans to celebrate during the qualifying rounds.
The top-ranked Huskers, trailing by 200 pins at one point, blasted Vanderbilt by 176 pins in the final round of qualifying to earn the top seed heading into today’s bracket play.
Vanderbilt was 42 pins behind after four games of conventional competition and 20 games of the Baker scoring.
In Baker scoring, five bowlers compete for each team. The first bowler throws the first and sixth frames, the second throws the second and seventh, and so on.
NU’s Baker counted a 244 game in the morning session. In the afternoon during Baker scoring, she was in NU’s key fifth spot, throwing the fifth frame and the all-important 10th frame.
Five times she rolled three strikes in the 10th frame.
“To get a chance to bowl in front of our fans (for NU’s first home meet in almost a decade) with our team is an honor,” Baker said. “I think our freshmen were nervous. I was nervous for them because I’ve been through four of these tournaments.
“But I reminded them that we can work through the rough spots like we had today and we can always make better decisions on the lanes.”
Straub said he made better decisions as the day progressed, too.
He questioned the approach he recommended to his team and the type of bowling balls to use.
“The lane conditions were very hard and we struggled early and that was my mistake,” he said. “I think I made fewer mistakes as the conditions got better for us.”
Today’s competition starts at 9:30 a.m. and concludes about 9 p.m. There will be two four-team brackets in a double-elimination tournament that concludes Saturday night with the final two teams bowling on national television (ESPNU, cable 235) for the title. Nebraska won the first two NCAA championships, in 2004 and 2005.
Reach Ken Hambleton at 473-7313 or khambleton@journalstar.com.
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