1/9/10 North Jersey Singles Classic @ Parkway Lanes

Today's episode: "The BCSL Tango & the Pennsylvania Polka." The boys final was a showdown between Bergen County Scholastic League National/Olympic rivals Dylan Caruso of Secaucus and Matt Priore of North Arlington. On the girls side, Lorisa Jones of Marist squared off with Jillian Keller of Pennsbury (Pa.) — if you thought Howell came a long way to win the Holiday Team Challenge last month, the Falcons one-upped them; Pennsbury is 30 miles west of Philadelphia. And, much like Howell, the Keystone State contingent had an FDU connection: head coach Christi White bowled for the Knights' NCAA championship team in 2006.

Speaking of FDU, Mike LoPresti and the gang did another great job of putting the tournament together, and they made a couple of tweaks this year. Instead of staggering the starts of the boys and girls tournaments, they started both at around the same time — still a long day, but that was a plus time-wise. The concept of byes for the Top 4 bowlers in the first round was a nice addition, too, although once again, neither No. 1 reached the finals. Extra thanks to Lisa (whose computer thankfully did NOT crash this year) for help with score printouts.

There were a fair share of monster scores on the day. Four bowlers took perfect games into the 10th frame, and two of them were Paramus Catholic lefties: Matt Vanderhoof in qualifying Game 2 ended with a 267, and Steve Natoli in the Round of 12 rolled a 276. Also, Michael Higgins of Ridgefield Park took it down to the last ball of Q-Game 3 and shot a 298, and Steven Patchen of Bergen Tech fired a 275 in the Round of 36.

Fans of the old-fashioned 1-on-1 roll-offs got a treat as well. Pascack Hills' Bryan Kist and Old Tappan's Kyle Folkers were tied for the final transfer spot to the "Desirable Dozen" (well, the FDU folks almost rolled a perfecto) — both struck on their first ball and both struck on their second ball, before Kist got a 6 and Folkers shot an 8. In the girls "Great Eight," Crystal Keller of Lenape Valley and Taylor Maurer of Queen of Peace tied for the fourth semifinal spot — both threw strikes before Maurer got an 8 and Keller struck.

Crystal attempted to make it an all-Keller final, but the semifinal scores were quite impressive, and Jones and Jillian Keller advanced. IRONY ALERT: Crystal Keller's 225 in the semis would have been good enough to advance to the boys finals. Thanks to coach LoPresti for pointing that out. Also, big props to second girls semifinalist Maylena Marks of Leonia... she went 154-202 in her first two Q-Games, dropped to 136 in Game 3, but held on to earn the final spot in the Round of 20. Then, in her march to the semis, she also had the top score (205) in the Round of 8. That is a quality bounce-back effort for you.

Caruso, meanwhile, made the boys semifinals for the second straight year and took it a step further. However, he was hurt by an open frame late in the finals, and Priore was just locked in. He started the day with a 181 and threw all deuces the rest of the way to the title match, then wrapped things up with a 191-173 win over his BCSL rival in the finals.

As for Jillian Keller — egads, we just became the New Jersey Bowling Blog, is it time to expand into Pennsylvania already? At least we know the Falcons had something to talk about on the long ride home, and Keller was a deserving champ. Jones threw BB's all day, but Keller left only the final two pins standing in the finals, sealing a 235-156 victory with a late 4-bagger. P.S. If you follow the above link, you'll get more evidence that Miss Keller of Pa. is the real deal. Incidentally, there is no relation between she and Miss Keller of N.J.

Tournament season is starting to heat up in earnest — Counties ahead next weekend, and The Messenger will be at the Bergen Couny Girls Tournament, although he is still contemplating starting a morning-afternoon doubleheader at Passaic County. See you on the other side...

BOYS - ROLL-OFF QUALIFIERS

1. Jonathan Glattstein (North Bergen), 777; 2. Matt Vanderhoof (Paramus Cath.), 733; 3. Brian Galbraith (Pascack Hills), 729; 4. Alex Prell (Wood-Ridge), 716; 5. Kyle Landau (Ramsey), 691; 6. Jaylin Floyd (Manchester Reg.), 662; 7. George Bosch (Queen of Peace), 661; 8. Joshuah Romero (Teaneck), 661; 9. Ted Failla (Paramus Cath.), 657; 10. Nick Roman (Wood-Ridge), 653; 11. Steven Patchen (Bergen Tech), 653; 12. Rob Oszust (Lenape Valley), 647; 13. Nicholas Deliantis (St. Mary-Ruth.), 646; 14. Matt Priore (N. Arlington), 642; 15. Chris Auld (Fair Lawn), 634; 16. Greg Corradi (DePaul), 633; 17. Dylan Caruso (Secaucus), 632; 18. Brian DeMarco (Bergenfield), 629; 19. Jonathan Eckstein (Indian Hills), 629; 20. Brian O'Flaherty (Pascack Valley), 624; 21. Sean Carmody (Ridgefield Park), 621; 22. Ryan Landau (Ramsey), 616; 23. Sam Delgado (Union City), 612; 24. Brian Kist (Pascack Hills), 610; 25. Andrew Suscreba (Q of P), 609; 26. Jimmy Rivers (Westwood), 606; 27. Steve Natoli (Paramus Cath.), 606; 28. Michael Higgins (Ridgefield Park), 602; 29. Nicholas Keim (Ridgefield Park), 600; 30. James Hoover (Teaneck), 599; 31. Larry Tufaro (Wallkill Valley), 599; 32. Marc Solangon (Bergenfield), 599; 33. Soungjin Choi (DePaul), 596; 34. Corey Burtwell (Passaic Tech), 595; 35. Kyle Folkers (Old Tappan), 594; 36. Johnson Pau (Bergen Tech), 594.

BOYS ROUND OF 36 (Top 12 advance): Glattstein, Vanderhoof, Galbraith and Prell — BYE; 5. Patchen, 275; 6. Priore, 268; 7. Tufaro, 259; 8. Natoli, 257; 9. Hoover, 253; 10. Caruso, 248; 11. Suscreba, 245; 12. Folkers, 232*; 13. Kist, 232; 14. Auld, 224; 15. Pau, 223; 16. Floyd, 213; 17. Bosch, 207; 18. Carmody, 203; 19. (tie) O'Flaherty and Keim, 202; 21. (tie) R.Landau and Rivers, 198; 23. (tie) Higgins and Burtwell, 194; 25. Romero, 193; 26. Oszust, 190; 27. Roman, 189; 28. (tie) Corradi and Eckstein, 185; 30. Deliantis, 180; 31. Solangon, 177; 32. Choi, 175; 33. Failla, 172; 34. DiMarco, 169; 35. Delgado, 162; 36. K.Landau, 154.
*Advanced via roll-off

BOYS ROUND OF 12 (Top 4 advance): 1. Priore, 277; 2. Natoli, 276; 3. Glattstein, 258; 4. Caruso, 241; 5. Vanderhoof, 211; 6. Suscreba, 210; 7. Folkers, 200; 8. Prell, 192; 9. Galbraith, 187; 10. Patchen, 172; 11. Hoover, 171; 12. Tufaro, 161.

BOYS SEMIFINALS: 1. Priore, 227; 2. Caruso, 206; 3. Natoli, 191; 4. Glattstein, 177.

BOYS FINALS: Matt Priore 191, Dylan Caruso 173.

GIRLS - ROLL-OFF QUALIFIERS

1. Crystal Keller (Lenape Valley), 641; 2. Jillian Keller (Pennsbury), 634; 3. Nicole Sussman (Raritan), 610; 4. Lorisa Jones (Marist), 601; 5. Ashley Johnson (N. Arlington), 593; 6. Rebecca VanDyk (Q of P), 573; 7. Sonja Shirak (Clifton), 568; 8. Megan McNally (Pascack Hills), 561; 9. Nicole Linder (IHA), 554; 10. Taylor Maurer (Q of P), 548; 11. Taylor Strothmann (IHA), 543; 12. Stacy Fernandez (Ridgefield Park), 538; 13. Colette Malyack (DePaul), 528; 14. Ashley Plenski (Pennsbury), 514; 15. Beth Moser (Pennsbury), 507; 16. Tara Bechter (Pennsbury), 502; 17. Nikki Villani (Lyndhurst), 499; 18. Kim Ercolino (Bergen Tech), 494; 19. Adriana Stapelman (Fair Lawn), 493; 20. Maylena Marks (Leonia), 492.

GIRLS ROUND OF 20 (Top 8 advance): C.Keller, J.Keller, Sussman and Jones — BYE; 5. Shirak, 213; 6. Maurer, 204; 7. Villani, 196; 8. Marks, 195; 9. Johnson, 193; 10. Linder, 190; 11. Bechter, 186; 12. Malyack, 181; 13. Plenski, 177; 14. McNally, 173; 15. Fernandez, 162; 16. Stapelman, 159; 17. Moser, 155; 18. Ercolino, 150; 19. Strothmann, 139; 20. VanDyk, 134.

GIRLS ROUND OF 8 (Top 4 advance): 1. Marks, 205; 2. J.Keller, 193; 3. Jones, 191; 4. C.Keller, 183*; 5. Maurer, 183; 6. Villani, 182; 7. Sussman, 176; 8. Shirak, 169.
*Advanced via roll-off

GIRLS SEMIFINALS: 1. Jones, 247; 2. J.Keller, 236; 3. C.Keller, 225; 4. Marks, 131.

GIRLS FINALS: Jillian Keller 235, Lorisa Jones 156.

HIGH GAMES (BOYS QUALIFYING): Michael Higgins, 298; Jonathan Glattstein, 280; Matt Vanderhoof, 269, 267; Kyle Landau, 265; Alex Prell and Rob Oszust, 264; Nick Roman, 258. HIGH GAMES (GIRLS QUALIFYING): Lorisa Jones, 247; Taylor Maurer, 229; Crystal Keller, 228; Ashley Johnson and Megan McNally, 225; Jillian Keller and Rebecca VanDyk, 222.