By BILL SNIER
CANTON — It was only Game 2, but you didn’t want to be the one to end the run.
After shooting a combined 727 during Game 1 in the Tuesday Summer Trio league at Eastbury Bowling Center, the team of Marcus Marcelli, Alex McCourry and Brett McCourry came out striking — a lot — in Game 2.
After Marcelli and Alex McCourry started with strikes, Brett McCourry left a solid 9-pin and covered the spare.
Then, it was off to the races.
The trio did not have another miss until Alex McCourry’s third ball in the 10th frame when he left a 6-pin to finish with 299. That came after Marcelli, a 43-year-old Canton Township right-hander, recorded his 11th career 300.
“I told Alex, Marcus had easy street up there. He just had to go up and finish it off … and then he did,” said Brett McCourry, a 32-year-old Canton right-hander. “Then Alex goes for a double and it’s like, ‘Oh, hell, I have to strike.
“My knees were knocking and I could barely walk up there.”
Brett left, of all things, a 2-pin. He covered it, then struck on his final ball for 269, giving the team an 868 game — which ranks second in the nation to an 878.
“If not for that 9-pin in the first frame, we might have got it,” Brett said. “If I could have shot 289 we would have beaten it.
“It was about matching the next guy,” said Alex McCourry, a 29-year-old Canton left-hander. “You didn’t want to be the guy that misses.”
Marcelli was low man on the night with 748, while Alex had 756 after making a ball change on the fill ball in Game 1 to the Motiv Jackal Onyx.
Brett McCourry topped them all, starting with 288 in Game 1, leaving a 2-8 spare on his second ball in the 10th, and following with 269 and 257 for an 814 series — his fourth 800 overall in the 2024-25 season. He used a Roto Grip Ultimate Wrecker — his first time using the ball in league play after just two practice games for video purposes.
“That first game, I got nervous I guess … what the heck,” Brett said. “But it was a clean night overall.”
While Brett bowls all summer, it’s unusual for Alex to do the same.
“I usually play golf or other things in the summer. But (Brett) needed a bowler after quite a few fell through, so I’m out there,” Alex McCourry said.
In addition to the big game, the team’s series of 2,318 also ranks fourth overall in the nation for a three-man team.
Brett bowled in three leagues during the season and Alex in two. Both composited at around the same average — 233 — with both peaking in the 240s on the season in their respective leagues.