By BILL SNIER
COLUMBUS — If you think Cameron Crowe was surprised to hear he led his shift, his shock just escalated after he learned he has a 130-pin lead on the 28 players remaining.
Crowe finished with 2,068 total pinfall, averaging 258.5, to top a 141-player field during qualifying for the HP Lanes MEGA Singles event Saturday at HP Lanes.
Crowe did all his work on the early squad, coming back from a 217 start to not shoot another game under 248, including 300 in Game 5.
Justin Knowles, a 33-year-old Michigan left-hander, stood second — as he did behind the 23-year-old Crowe on the first shift — with 1,938.
“Life in the last year has been a bit difficult,” said Crowe, an Orland Park, Ill., two-handed lefty who spent two years with Team USA and currently is working as a bartender to cover his expenses. “I’m trying to figure out what I want to do in my life. I got my card, but I’m not sure if I want to go out on (PBA) Tour.
“I have a couple of job opportunities. If that happens fine, but the Tour is something I’ve always wanted to do. Who doesn’t keep chasing the little kid’s dream of being the best at whatever you do? That’s out there, but I’m not sure when that’s going to happen. Right now, I’m just going with the flow.”
Fero Williams, a 43-year-old right-hander who is in the process of moving his family to Baltimore, sits in the third spot after leading the second squad with 1,931. Williams, who won Friday’s doubles event for the second straight year with Zach Wilkins, shot 257 the final game to top the shift.
“Once the lanes started to transition, I had to get out of urethane,” said Williams, who started with a Storm IQ78 before going to the Idol and finishing with the 900 Global Sublime the last three games.
“The Sublime clears the front really good, but it’s really strong on the back end. So I just got left and played with my speed and angled the ball more right off my hand to get it to the friction and the urethane hold right of 10 (board) so it could store energy. If I would miss in, it would read early because the middle was so flat.”
The cut to the top 28 for Sunday’s 10 a.m. cashers’ round was at 1,759, with Mikey Tang earning the final spot by just five pins over Earon Volmer (1,754). Fifteen of the 28 remaining players advanced off of the second squad.
All pinfalls carry over to Sunday’s six-game early round before the field is cut again to the top eight for a modified stepladder finals.
Jean Faure Perez, the 44-year-old left-handed Puerto Rico native now living in Indianapolis, finished second on the second squad with 1,923, eight pins behind Williams. Worthington right-hander Chad Roberts took fourth off of the early shift with 1,924.
Perez had to adjust after making a strategic mistake with his equipment, starting with 212 and 225 out of the gate.
“I put a lot of surface on urethane and my ball was hooking more earlier than normal,” Perez said. “So I decided to stay with two balls and use them until there was some shine on them a bit so I could move left. Once I did that, my roll was more consistent.”
Perez went from the Storm IQ Red to the Fast Pitch for the final six games, averaging 253 in Games 3 through 7.
COLLEGE CHARGE
A pair of former University of Pikeville teammates — Cuyahoga Falls two-handed lefty Bryce Oliver and Bettsville lefty Hayden Tarris — were sitting 35th and 45th, respectively, on the second shift before finding their strides.
Oliver, who finished in the recent USBC U22 Masters and plans to return to Pikeville, averaged 253 in Games 4 through 7 to sit ninth overall with 1,838.
“I just quit being patient. I knew there was score out there and the (Hammer) Purples were going a little far and not carrying. I had two opens in three games and they were both splits,” the 22-year-old said. “I went back to the (Radical) Double Cross, got a little firmer, moved left and got it through the front section and it finished solid quick enough that it struck a bunch.”
Tarris stuck with his Purple, but made a move. It resulted in him shooting 825 over his final three games to finish third on the shift with 1,877 and sixth overall. He shot over 1,100 on the house oil pattern during Friday’s four-game doubles event.
“I was kind of playing inside around the seven or eight board, but I kept seeing some wiggle when I moved outside,” said Tarris, a sophomore who will be transferring to Indiana Tech in the fall. “After Game 4, I jumped left and went up the gutter. It really opened things up for me. I had a lot more miss room.”
Tyrell Ingalls, another former Team USA player like Crowe and the 2024 NAIA Championships MVP from Savannah College of Art and Design, led the second shift for the first four games before finishing fourth on the shift and eighth overall with 1,844. The two-handed righty struggled with 196, 203 and 216 his final three games.
But Sunday is a new day, despite the additional pinfalls.
“I have no plan. I’m just going to get out here and see what is there in the morning,” Williams said. “But I probably will start with urethane.”
The leader plans on taking it “one shot at a time” after missing the cut a year ago.
“Hopefully, it will play the same as today, but it feels good to be closer to the top,” Crowe said. “I have a little bit of cushion, but I want to keep the pedal to the metal and strike as much as humanly possible and keep this lead.
“Being the No. 1 seed in this tournament is pretty prestigious and something I definitely want to do.”
NOTEBOOK: The second shift had 75 players, bringing the total to 141, far below last year’s 180 player total. … Overall, 17 right-handers made the cut along with 11 lefties, with five of the top six being lefties. Roberts is the lone exception. … Elliot Greer shot the second 300 of the day in Game 5 of the second shift. … Defending champion Ryan Liederbach finished with 1,507, 116th overall. … There were four women in the second shift, with Breanna Clemmer making the cut with 1,784 after driving over to Ohio from Indiana after missing the cut in the PWBA event there. … The final three qualifiers came off of the opening squad. … Brooklyn High School sophomore Adam Cowper bowled in the event, taking the place of his father, Kevin, who had to pull out due to a hand injury. He finished in a tie for 84th overall with 1,596.
