Sectional Wrapup - Boys South

nj.com full results are here.  Story is here.  South lived up to the hype, I think.

GROUP I
This was one of the very few groupings that went 100% exactly according to the numbers. I think there were two others. Anyway, Cinnaminson got out to a lead, Maple Shade caught up to within one pin after two games, then Cinnaminson, led by Sean Harris's amazingly consistent 224-227-225=676 (good enough to advance as an individual) put it away in game three.  Maple Shade's strong 2735 set was powered by Dan Kenny (635) and Evan Deibert (659). Gloucester City made things interesting with a big 871 in the first game behind Matt Baus, who would go on to shoot 689 and qualify for the TOC.

GROUP II
We had some drama in this one, though, didn't we?  Deptford, who I stupidly ignored completely in the preview, came out charging with a big 989 to lead the field after game 1. Brent Ayres (214) and Matt Kaminski (233) led the Spartans, who would fade a bit, but never drop off completely.  Kaminski would finish at 666, and his team only 69 points out of a TOC spot.  Deptford was about 340 pins over average, finishing at a season-high (easily) 2733.  That's just great bowling.  Meanwhile, #15 Seneca had shot 973 in Game One thanks to Jacob Boris (234) and Eddie Cashwell (225), and held a 46-pin lead on the field by the end of the second game, with Lacey and Manchester right behind Deptford, fighting for that second TOC spot.  Seneca would put the title on ice in game three, shooting 1006 as Zach Malcolm (208) joined Cashwell (215) and Boris (225).  In the battle for the other Bowlero slot, Lacey would depend on all day on Nick Striffler, whose 238-269-201=708 would place him 9th overall, while Manchester was similarly led by freshman Kenny Burdge, who posted 253-229-245=727 to wind up 5th.  Game three was a squeaker, with these two Shore South B rivals fighting for the last spot, though Burlington made a great run, shooting 1003 behind Alexander Gagnon (226), Raymond Harney (221) and Andrew Brown (202).  Lots of bowlers performed great, as Brian Huebler's 257 for Lacey and Justin Villano's 223 for Manchester helped out Striffler and Burdge, but at the end, Lacey took the spot by a razor-thin 5-pin margin.  Boys or girls, these two schools have a magnificent rivalry.

GROUP III
I expected this to be a two-team battle between #3 Toms River South and #7 Brick Township, with #20 Central as a distant third choice.  If you just look at the final scores, you think that's exactly what happened.  That's NOT what happened.  TRS got off to a hot start, blasting a 1088 in game one behind Kyle Oliveri (210), Jim Breslin (200), Mike Laycock (235) and Chris Swindell (258).  Not unexpected.  Second place after one? Gloucester Tech. I know, right?  But there they were, putting up 1006, with Joseph Gallo (222), Zach Hansen (215) and Nicholas Sulina (226, on his way to a TOC-qualifying 669 set).  TRS was solid in game two, with Andrew Xiques'' 204 contributing to a 980 game, which gave the Indians a 93-pin lead over... yup, still Gloucester Tech.  John Atkinson (228) joined Sulina's 236 and gave the Cheetahs a 969 game to maintain 2nd.  But others were coming: St. Augustine shot 1005 behind Nick DiNunzio's 258 and Kyle Griffiths' 212.  Jackson Liberty posted 1025, with Brian Dalmar shooting 243 and Josh Botteri 264 (he would finish at 732, T-3rd overall).  Hammonton, led by Joey DiCamillo's 246-212 and Central, led by Brian Gural's 223-201 had combined for 4 team games between 945 and 956.  And Brick Township was in the mix, too: Nick Kafarski and Kyle Chirichello had a pair of 200 games each and Jordan Malizia shot 224 in game 2.  With TRS off in the distance, there were no less than SIX teams between 1901 and 1975 vying for second place.  It was madness.  Game three saw TRS put the title on ice with a strong 1050, giving them a 3118 total.  Chris Swindell's 244 finished off a 716 set that punched his ticket to North Brunswick on Wednesday.  Gloucester Tech had another strong game, 940, and Central's Michael Eak shot a big 259 to help his team to an impressive 2935.  But none of it mattered, because Brick Township shot the lights out: Chirichello 225, Malizia 226, and Kafarski, Nick Gross and Chris Shymanski each shot 234.  The game total was a sublime 1153, and not only did the Dragons secure second place and a TOC slot, they came within 22 pins of taking the title away from TRS.  The lesson: Never, ever, just read the final scores.

GROUP IV
I'm sticking with "bloodbath".  Someone with a more detailed knowledge of NJ HS bowling history please enlighten me: was this the most loaded sectional in the history of the sport?  How many teams in South, Group IV shot 2900?  EIGHT.  How many Group IV teams did that in the other four G-4 sectionals combined? four.  How many teams in the other four Group IV sectionals shot 3000?  One.  How many did it in South, Group IV?  FIVE.  I don't even know how to write about this without getting bogged down in numbers even more than I normally do.  There were 26 600s, including 5 700s in this 13-team grouping.   Three different teams had four bowlers shoot over 600 - and two of them didn't even make the TOC.  No matter what, a top ten team was going to be eliminated,  but a bunch of teams that had fantastic days are headed home as well.

#5 Shawnee led wire to wire after a monster start: Andrew Abbonizio (279), Nick Simonetti (248) and Chris Pagliuso (258) all went big and the team total was 1145.  It stayed reasonably close: the Renegardes had a 55 pin lead after 2 and won the title by just 26, but their ticket to the TOC was never in serious jeopardy.  Abbonizio finished with 210-268 for a 757 set to take the individual championship, too. #10 Cherry Hill East (220's by Adam Crognale and Kevin Babitz, 206 from Kyle Winter) and an utterly surprising Lenape squad (215 from Ryan Delozier, 213 by Jayen Patel, 238 by Devan Patel) each cracked 1000, and Jackson Memorial was just under.  The #1 team in New Jersey, Brick Memorial, had a rough start and found themselves 113 pins out of a TOC spot, and mired in eighth place.

The Mustangs are too good to let that be the end, and they got right back into the mix with a five-bowler-strong 1149: Cameron Waldheim (208), Alec Hehir (234), John Boughton (227), Michael Guzman (243) and Andrew Lazarchick (237) all hit.  But CHE was better than Game one as well, with Anthony Mathis's 244 helping his team shoot 1050, and Jackson Memorial was even better: Steve Gold (237), Brandon Mumm (219), Brad Aumann (215) and Steve Nicholsen (257 on his way to a seventh overall 714) all shot big and the team scored 1098.  Egg Harbor Township and Eastern were each just under 1000, too.  No lead was safe, but it looked like the contenders might have separated a bit.  After two games it was: Shawnee 2151, Jackson Memorial 55 back, CHE 13 behind Jax, and Brick Memorial 27 behind Jax.  That's really tight.  And Egg Harbor had their two stars going nuts: Jason Pesce (214-259-222=695) and Matthew Stephens (279-227-226=732) would both comfortably qualify for individual advacement; you couldn't rule them out either at 114 back.

So, three teams had shot 1000 in game 1, four did it in game 2.  With everything on the line, how many would top a grand in Game 3?  Six.  Shawnee's 1024 clinched their championship at 3175. Toms River North put up a cool 1027 behind James Bolish's 214 and Josh Burns' 265, but their run came a bit too late and they took eighth (eighth!) with 2906. Burns shot 700 and qualified as an individual.  Matthew Young (233) and Jeff Leonard (235) helped Eastern post 1010 in the final game and shoot a near-season-high 2918, which landed seventh. Even with two supermen, Egg Harbor slipped a bit in game 3 and took 6th (2929).  Jackson Memorial also came back to earth a bit, but finished with a season-high 3013 set and 5th place in The Toughest Sectional Ever.  Lenape finished incredibly strong: Delozier (245), Brendan Kelly (234) and the Patels (222 each, which probably took some planning) led their squad to a season-high and thoroughly amazing 3047 set and a hard-fought 4th place.  Devan Patel earned advancement to Bowlero as well with his 695.

Brick Memorial was good in game 3, with Hehir (214), Boughton (216) and Lazarchick (205) over 200, but the team's 1009 was not quite up to their standards, and it would prove to be short of what they needed to complete the comeback, because Cherry Hill East put up a huge gut-check 1066 game, led by Babitz (201), Emerson Levy (238) and the freshman, Mathis, who finished a brilliant 711 series with a final-game 267.  He's headed to the individual TOC, too.

"It's a shame somebody had to lose" is awfully cliche, but I don't know what else to write here.  It's a damn shame that inequality of competition geographically means that teams with legitimate state title talent are eliminated at this stage, and it's absurd that the cutline to advance to the state individual TOC is 668 (though, of course, we've seen much higher in past years), but I'm not sure there's a reasonable solution any time in the near future.

Congrats to all the teams that bowled well, and shout out to the Olympic conference, who certainly removed any lingering doubt that they can hang with, and beat, the big boys.


INDIVIDUALS
I just wrote like 50,000 words, is there anyone I missed?

The answer is yes.  Nick DiNunzio of St. Augustine (670), Joshua Lipko of Cherry Hill West (673) and Westampton Tech's Jordan Shackleford (668) were all mentioned in the preview as individual contenders, and all came through with sets high enough to earn advancement.

I have to be honest, I don't know Mark Friedman of Cedar Creek, though it's entirely possible that I've seen him bowl at some point.  Anyway, entered as an independent, Friedman was excellent, shooting 226-254-258=738 to claim second place in the sectional behind Abbonizio.