By BILL SNIER
CANTON — As Dana Gates turned 54 on May 24, a lot has changed for both her and her daughter, Tori Gates, in one calendar year.
Dana, a Canton Township right-hander and bus driver for Canton Local Schools, made the decision to undergo reconstructive surgery on her left knee In June 2023.
Tori, a 26-year-old right-hander employed by the Brian Law Offices, fractured the cuboid bone in her left foot and spent six months in a boot. But that was just the beginning.
Bowling was the furthest thing from both of the minds during the summer of 2023. But there they were, both of them, competing together to conclude the 2023-24 winter season during the Monday Nite Ladies Trio league at Eastbury Bowling Center.
How did they both make it back? It came one step at a time.
CHANGES TO GET ON LANES
Dana Gates faced a decision following the 2022-23 winter bowling season.
“Dr. (Michael) Lykins saw black spots on my knee. He said it could crack and I could be really in trouble,” Dana said. “He told me I could wait and do nothing or be on crutches for six months.
“I told him I can’t do that. Let’s just get it done. I just knew I was going to bowl.”
She was on her feet a day after surgery, but it was about two weeks later when she was able to begin therapy.
“Dr. Lykins told me I should be good (to bowl) this season,” Dana said. “But to do it, I had to get my knee to bend at last 20 percent.”
With the help of her husband, Canton South High School bowling coach Brian Gates, she returned to the lanes for the first time at AMF Hall of Fame for practice in August in hopes of being able to start the season.
Dana, who used 14-pound equipment and a six-step delivery, had to make drastic changes at first just to get on the lanes. That came after she had to learn to walk again.
It started with her dropping to 12 pounds with her equipment. Then, she made her first attempts using a one-step delivery — putting two feet together and taking one step to the foul line.
“She was extremely nervous. The first few shots, she didn’t know if she was going to fall off the shots or not,” Brian Gates said. “But it came down to getting that trust factor back where she could put her weight over the shot and stay solid. It’s something she had to work through.”
But she started the season on time.
She stayed with the 12-pound equipment for about two weeks before returning to her normal 14-pound balls. But she had to stay with the one-step delivery until December to protect the knee.
It was frustrating for a woman who averaged nearly 200 and had been bowling for 19 seasons, with three 700 series to her credit.
“I was only averaging in the 130s. I knew that’s all I could do at that point, but knowing where my average normally is, it was frustrating,” Dana said.
“While she was establishing average in the league, the team was just getting crushed basically, and there was nothing she could do,” said Brian, who was present watching his wife and daughter bowl each Monday.
The change came in December, when Dana moved to a four-step delivery for the first time since surgery.
“It really didn’t take that long to get my timing down,” Dana said. “I was going slow at the beginning just to make sure I wasn’t going too fast and messing up. But the one-step delivery did make me more accurate with my shots.”
Brian Gates agreed.
“With the one step, she was just waiting on the ball and releasing it, not muscling it. Just letting it roll,” Brian said. “When she returned to the four-step, she was waiting on the ball and not muscling through.”
“I tried bowling with different (knee) braces,” Dana said, “but it just threw me off … threw my timing off.”
BUILDING HER WAY BACK
Tori Gates had an entirely different road to the end of the season. After an MRI in August determined the bone break, she chose not to have surgery, but remain in the boot.
But that was just the start of her problems.
Pain from her sciatic nerve on the right side was a continuing factor.
“I had the original x-ray in June, but it didn’t show anything. They wanted to do a bone simulator, but I had to wait three months for the MRI and that was another nine months in a boot, so I said no, I’m over it,” Tori said. “So I took myself out of the boot at the end of September.”
Then came the sciatic nerve problem after she started the season. But, next up, she had to have emergency surgery to remove her gall bladder.
Many might have given up at that point. Not Tori Gates.
“After the gall bladder surgery, I was able to lift over 30 pounds until after the first week. I think I was down about six weeks after that,” Tori said. “I’ve been bowling since I was 5 years old.
“I went back to bowling after the sciatic nerve was hurting. I just kept telling myself, I would be fine. I tried to bowl with an ankle brace and taped it up a couple of times. I just kept saying it wasn’t that bad.”
But the six weeks off following the gall bladder surgery was a blessing for her other ailments.
“The foot just doesn’t hurt like it used to, and the rest really improved the sciatic problem,” said Tori, who also had taken two years off from bowling to care for her daughter.
TOGETHER AGAIN.
As the weather got colder, the Gateses got stronger.
Dana got a new bowling ball, a Motiv Raptor Fury — and her first set with the new ball was a 699. After getting a needed double in the 10th frame of Game 3, she had a six-count on her final ball to miss 700. She also bowled in a bi-weekly league at Eastbury this season.
After averaging in the 130s the first half, she averaged in the high 190s in the second half to boost her overall average into the 160s on Mondays.
But she still would like to return to her old six-step delivery.
“I went to six steps last year to get more ball speed with the pain,” Dana said. “But now, I’m getting more ball speed with the four-step and I’m not hurting.”
Tori, a former Canton South bowler, finished out at 183 despite her various physical problems.
“We kind of pushed each other through the problems,” said Tori, who also bowled with her mother in the Ohio State USBC Women’s Championships in Toledo. “It helped.”
So what’s next?
Dana and Brian are bowling a summer league at Eastbury. Tori wasn’t planning to, but …
“They signed me up, so apparently I have no option,” Tori said.
And a new year begins with new optimism on the lanes.