By BILL SNIER
CANTON — Despite shooting 748 over his first three games, Brian Bell told his partner he felt it was time to make a change.
Dylan Rinella just laughed at his partner.
“The trick is to see the move before the move,” Ball, a 51-year-old Massillon right-hander, said. “Sometimes it’s right and sometimes it’s wrong. But it’s better to be proactive than reactive, especially when (the lanes) get like this.”
He may have laughed at the thought, but Rinella respects Ball’s opinion.
“Guys like him and (Joe) Hostetler … they just see the lanes totally different than the rest of us amateur bowlers,” said Rinella, a 30-year-old Akron two-handed righty.
The move paid off all through match play and particularly during the finals of Saturday’s College Bowl Tournaments 50-50 doubles event at AMF Hall of Fame Lanes.
While Rinella and the opposing team of Joe Stauffer and Chase Barstow had their problems with Lanes 17-18, Ball was able to find a solution, striking on six of his first seven shots and helping lift his partner to a 408-388 victory.
Ball’s decision came in the final qualifying game — going from a straighter angle to opening up the lane.
“You just can’t throw it straight when there’s friction. You throw it too hard and it never hits and never strikes,” said Ball, who now has three wins and one second in his last three College Bowl Tournaments events. “The ball will never pick up, and it never slows down so you just get 10-pinned to death.”
Ball finished with 985 on the day, including a high of 278 in Game 1, while Rinella had 935, teaming with his partner to shoot a tourney-high 547 out of the gate. The pair led qualifying until Game 4, falling back to third to reach the eight-team match-play round.
“They started off really easy and got really tricky,” Ball said. “The longer we bowled, the tougher it got, but that’s typical Hall of Fame.”
Rinella struggled in the opening match with 182, but with Ball shooting 226 the pair came away with a 408-389 win over No. 6 seed Hostetler and Matt Coffelt.
But both rolled it well in the semifinals, rolling 244 each en route to a 488-409 win over No. 7 seed Brett McCourry and Don Sprout.
REACHING TITLE MATCH
Stauffer, who turned 50 in January, approached Barstow a couple of weeks ago about bowling together.
“I was subbing for J.D. (Jones) on Friday (at Eastbury), and we were up at the same time on the approach,” said Barstow, a 21-year-old two-handed Alliance righty. “He said, ‘I’m 50 now so if you want to bowl anything together …’
“I asked him if he wanted to bowl Jeff’s (Dimarzio) 50-50, and he said sure.”
The pair hit admittedly their toughest pair, Lanes 5-6, in Game 1, shooting 415 and sitting 16th.
From there, Stauffer finished with 901, including 290 in Game 2, and Barstow had 970 to earn the No. 4 seed for match play.
“The middle (of the center’s low side) was easier, and the end pair was rough,” Stauffer, a 50-year-old Canton right-hander, said. “But Lanes 5 and 6 were just brutal.”
“It was the worst pair and we hit it right off the bat,” Barstow said.
But Stauffer and Barstow came out smoking in match play, shooting 509 to win their opening match against No. 5 seed Matt Bertolette and Bob Eckenrode (466).
They continued strong in their second match against top-seeded Joe Altimore III and Alex Lincoln, combining for a 488-408 win.
But conditions changed in the title match.
CHAMPIONSHIP MATCH
Rinella liked what he saw in practice on the title pair, but that quickly changed.
“I just had too much over-under. It just got so bad,” said Rinella, who used a Storm Virtual Energy Blackout. “I also wasn’t making very good shots. I did switch to a different ball, but I went back because it was so bad.”
Stauffer encountered the same problems as Rinella.
“There was a little bit of over-under out there. If I got it out early, it checked early. And if I got it inside, it would skate so far,” Stauffer said. “I was in between.”
Barstow had gone away from opening up the lane to going straighter — his ‘A’ game —in Game 2 of qualifying and stayed with it the rest of the day.
“In match play I was just trying to throw it hard and right with some forward roll on it,” Barstow said. “I couldn’t throw it much harder without giving up control. But I just didn’t move in enough or get it right enough.”
While Ball got on his early run, Rinella finished with just three strikes in the game (all on the left lane) and 7-10 and 4-6-7 splits. While his partner finished with 246, Rinell had 162.
“I lofted the heads a couple of times and that didn’t work. I tried a ball change and that didn’t work,” said Rinella, who has teamed with Ball to win two College Bowl Tournaments doubles — their only two times together in CBT events.
“But, obviously, it’s good to have a solid partner.”
Ball stayed clean throughout to finish with 246.
Stauffer and Barstow both had doubles early — Stauffer opened with a 2-4-10 split in the first frame — but the latter had the only other double for the team the remainder of the game. The two combined for 10 strikes in the match.
“A couple of my shots early checked up and that surprised me,” Barstow said. “I thought I was going to get more push down from Brian and Dylan’s balls. I figured I could get the same motion they had, but it rolled too early and I paid the price.”
Barstow also left a 4-6 split in the sixth frame. He followed it with a double, but had spares in the ninth and 10th frames while Stauffer was unable to double after a strike in the eighth.
“I went to a more aggressive ball early, but I had to send it right and try to get it to hold off the last game,” Stauffer said. “They cliffed a little.”
Ball used his Ebonite The One Reverb during match play after also using the Ion Pro during qualifying.
He was asked, “I guess they set up good for you.”
“They all did,” Rinella said. “There’s not a pair out there he doesn’t like.”
Ball tore the skin on his thumb during his last CBT singles finals loss to Coffelt in September.
“It almost happened again today,” said Ball, who drills his own equipment “I guess I have to talk to my ball driller about that.”
NOTEBOOK: The event drew 25 doubles teams. Each team had one person age 50 and older and one bowler age 49 and younger. As with all CBT events, it was contested on the house oil pattern. … Altimore and Lincoln led qualifying with 1,988, 71 pins ahead of Dean Billings and Frank Testa, with Rinella and Ball third at 1,920. … Altimore, who bowls both right-handed and left-handed in league play as he recovers from right elbow surgery, had his first 300 since the surgery in Game 4 of qualifying to help his team earn the No. 1 seed. Altimore turned in the high qualifying series of 1,010 — the only bowler to break 1,000. … Rich Daniel and Troy Workman earned the final match-play spot with 1,793, 16 pins ahead of Jim Fellows and Brandon Clifford. … Our thanks to Jeff Dimarzio and Dawn Altimore-Eckenrode for their assistance with this report. … The next CBT event will be a singles at 10 a.m. Nov. 9 at Park Centre Lanes. Entry fee is $65 with bowlers rolling four qualifying games. See the CBT Facebook page at https://www.facebook.com/groups/1732438633645945 for information.
COLLEGE BOWL TOURNAMENTS 50-50 DOUBLES
(Saturday, at AMF Hall of Fame Lanes, Canton)
Quarterfinals
(Single-game match play, losing teams receive $125 per team)
Brian Ball (226)-Dylan Rinella (182) d. Matt Coffelt (181)-Joe Hostetler (208) 408-389
Alex Lincoln (224)-Joe Altimore III (174) d. Eric Daniel (176)-Troy Workman (165) 398-341
Joe Stauffer (254)-Chase Barstow (255) d. Matt Bertolette (219)-Bob Eckenrode(247) 509-466
Brett McCourry (279)-Don Sprout (203) d. Frank Testa (226)-Dean Billings (235) 482-461
Semifinals
(Single-game match play; losing teams receive $250)
Rinella (244)-Ball (244) d. Sprout (202)-McCourry (207) 488-409
Stauffer (254)-Barstow (234) d. Altimore (220)-Lincoln (188) 488-408
Championship
(Single-game match play; winning team receives $900; losing team receives $500)
Rinella (162)-Ball (246) d. Stauffer (186)-Barstow (202) 408-388
