FAIRLAWN — Dom Barrett knew the opportunity to make history was there. He was just trying not to let himself think about it too much.
“I knew this tournament would complete the Triple Crown,” the 36-year-old Great Bentley, England, right-hander said. “But knowing about it and thinking about it … I felt getting ahead of myself could easily happen.”
Barrett no longer has to just dream about it.
After rolling a 279 during a semifinal win, Barrett struck on four of his first five shots in the title match and took advantage of some breaks to claim his first KIA PBA Tournament of Champions title Sunday at AMF Riviera Lanes.
The second-seeded Barrett, who captured the 2013 PBA World Championship and the 2018 U.S. Open, became the eighth player to capture the PBA Triple Crown with his 210-189 win over 2020 TOC champion Kris Prather.
“This is just unbelievable. I just can’t put into words what this means,” Barrett said. “I can’t bring myself to think about it yet.”
The TOC crown gives Barrett nine career PBA titles, with five of them being international. His last title came in the 2019 WBT Kuwait Open in Kuwait City, Kuwait.
“The last couple of years with COVID have been really difficult. I was able to practice, but competition just wasn’t there,” said Barrett, who won $100,000 for his win. “I came back to a real slump, and I had to work really hard through it.
“For about the past 18 months my competitive self was able to get me into some later rounds in tournaments. I had some injury aggravations in some places, but at the start of this year, I was able to feel like I was getting into competitive bowling again and not worrying about things.”
Barrett came out firing with the same Columbia Speed ball he had used most of the second half of the week, striking on his first seven shots before leaving a 10-pin in the semifinal against Shawn Maldonado. He then struck out for a 279-201 win.
“The right lane was tighter down lane and hooked early. So I tried to use that hook in the front part,” Barrett said. “The first shot I threw wasn’t my best, but it came back on the tighter lane and I was able to get into it from there.”
Prather, The No. 1 seed who came from the No. 5 seed to win his only major during the 2020 TOC, doubled to start the title match. Little did he know it would be his only two strikes until the 10th frame.
“Dom bowled a great game obviously, but I sure didn’t get any breaks,” Prather said. “I threw one really bad shot in the ninth. And it wasn’t even exactly bad because I put the ball exactly where I wanted it, but it just didn’t do what I thought it was going to do.”
Barrett left a 10-pin in the second frame with strikes in his others through the fifth. But in the sixth, he left a 1-2-4-5-10 washout followed by a 3-6-10 in the seventh. He covered the former, but got a break on the latter when the 3-pin bounced out to cover the spare which he had appeared to chop.
“I tried to use the hook in the front part of the lane and I kind of missed it on the right lane,” Barrett said of his shot in the sixth. “On the second shot, I tried not to push it through my spot on the lane, but it probably came off my hand too good. I was fortunate on the spare.”
Fortunate didn’t describe Prather’s day. The 30-year-old Plainfield, Ill., right-hander, who was seeking his fifth career title, left one-pin spares in the third, fourth fifth, seventh and eighth frames, including two stuffed 9-pins. He also chopped a 3-6-10 spare in the sixth.
“I kept telling myself the pins are going to fall down, but they never did,” Prather said. “Physically, I felt great. I repeated shots well, but only had two strikes until the 10th.
“I don’t trip a four or a nine and Don bounces that 3-pin out to make the 3-6-10. The couple of breaks he did have made the difference in the match.”
Barrett was not watching as Prather struggled.
“I just couldn’t get ahead of myself. Just make good shots and not think about the results or strikes,” Barrett said. “I knew he had those 9-pins and other single-pin spares he left, but I was trying to focus on myself.”
What made it worse is that Prather had a good look on the practice pair, striking on 15 straight shots.
“It was like, all right, cool, I have something,” Prather said. “It was close to how I was playing. But I couldn’t have walked won there with a four-foot stick and got them all.”
In earlier stepladder matches, Maldonado had to go to a one-ball rolloff to stop 20-time PBA champion Tommy Jones, the 2007 TOC winner. The two players tied at 216 after both had opens in the 10th frame — Jones missing a 7-pin spare and Maldonado left a 2-4-10 split after missing a 10-pin spare in the ninth.
Both left splits in the one-ball rolloff, with Maldonado advancing 8-7.
Maldonado then struck on five of his last seven shots to stop No. 3 seed Sean Rash 212-187. Rash, a 39-year-old Montgomery, Ill., right-hander, had three splits in the match after opening with three strikes in a row. He was seeking his second TOC crown and 18th title overall.
But Maldonado then ran into a buzzsaw in Barrett, who made just a board or two move between the semifinal and final matches. “The history of that pair of lanes came together for me today,” Barrett added.
The first thing Barrett thought about was his family, making the call home to catch his 3-year-old son Colby before he went to bed back home in England, where it was prime time.
“The sacrifices I put in for my family, not being there as a dad and husband for six months out of the year, is very tough,” Barrett said. “To be able to do this selfishly and provide for them is amazing. This is all for them.”
Along with a Triple-Crown performance.
“Some day, when I look back on my career, I can say I’m a Triple Crown winner,” Barrett added. “I just don’t know how that feels just yet.”
See complete tournament scores here:
https://www.r2sports.com/website/standings.asp?TID=38031
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