BATON ROUGE - With the calendar turning to November, entry blanks are out for events coming up in the next few months and none more prevalent than the open, women’s and youth city championships set for All Star Lanes in December.

The youth tournament will be Dec. 6-7, while the open and women’s tournament will be Dec. 6-7 and 13-14. Entries close on Nov. 14.

The city championship is a four-member event with Team event on Saturday, Dec. 6 and Sunday, Dec. 14 (9 a.m. and 1 p.m.). The doubles and singles events will be bowled on Sunday, Dec. 7 and Saturday Dec. 13 (9 a.m. and 1 p.m.).

There is handicap and scratch divisions including all-events and also a senior handicap all-events for those 55+. Bowlers may only bowl once in doubles and singles but more than once in team, but as usual only your first team event score is used for all-events.

There will be the chance to win mystery score pots, eliminators and high game pots for bowlers in the event as well as and addition $500 from the association added to handicap team, handicap doubles and handicap singles for the open and women’s divisions.

Now I say this with a disclaimer which I will explain in a moment. I do think it is important to support any local bowling association and the city championships.

The disclaimer is that I haven’t been able to bowl in recent January events because of my work schedule at my main job because of conflicts. Unfortunately, I will be out-of-town on three of the fourth days, but look out people, I’ll have a team for the final day. I’m looking forward to it.

Baton Rouge has already hosted the state senior event and All Star Lanes will also host the Louisiana State Women’s Championships for three weekends starting on Jan. 24-25. Doubles and singles will be bowled on Jan. 24 and 31 and Feb. 7 with team event on Jan. 25 and Feb. 1 and 8. It should be noted that the first two weekends there will be two shifts each day and only one each day on Feb. 7-8.

Entries close on Dec. 23 for this event.

College Bowling

Southern Jaguar freshman bowler Maria Molina Diaz of Bogota, Columbia, had a great finish in the Track Kat Klash in Houston, finishing 18th in the individual competition with a five-game total of 939 (187.8 average). Diaz had games of 209 and 211 in the first three games to post 600 in the event. She was the top SWAC bowler among the four conference teams in the event.

No. 9 Louisiana Tech had a good tournament, finishing in second place, with individually Paulina Avalos finishing in fourth at 1,036 and Juliana Kerrigan in eight at 1,003.

Mia Stolakis was best for Tulane in 20th place at 932.

Most of the teams including Southern will be in Fort Worth this weekend for an event hosted by Louisiana Tech and the big one comes up Nov. 21-23 in Harahan, Louisiana at Colonial Lanes when Tulane hosts its annual event.

Coming Up In Alexandria

A Thanksgiving Weekend big money tournament has been on the docket for a few years now in Alexandra at Four Season and this year will be no different. The Nightmare Before Christmas scratch shootout will be held Nov. 28-30 with the tournament offering a $6,000 top prize based on 200 entries.

It is five games across 10 pairs of lanes with five qualifying shifts (two on Nov. 28 and three on Nov. 29) before the field is cut to match play on Nov. 30 with each match a best two-of-three competition. Games won, not pinfall. Deep South Bowling and Joseph King and Four Seasons have done a good job putting this event on in past years.

Back with you next Monday.

                Until then, good luck and good bowling,

                                                         Kent Lowe