WPU Traveling to Dallas for Sectionals
William Penn University Athletics
by Wade Steinlage
Oskaloosa–The William Penn bowling teams will head to the Lonestar State in two weeks as they have yet again qualified for the USBC Intercollegiate Team Sectionals.
The men and women, ranked #17 and #24 respectively on the collegebowling.com website, will trek to Dallas, Texas on March 10-11 for the event at USA Bowl. The tournament is a Baker format consisting of 64 total games–32 each day.
The other sectional tournaments will be held at Stratford, N.J., Fairview Heights, Ill., and Smyrna, Tenn. The Dallas event features the fewest teams on both the men’s and women’s sides.
For the men, it is their eighth sectionals trip in nine years on the lanes, while the women have now qualified for sectionals all nine years of the program’s existence.
#1 Calumet-St. Joseph (Ind.) will lead the Fairview Heights sectional, while #2 Wisconsin-Whitewater tops the Smyrna sectional. #6 William Paterson (N.J.) is the highest-ranked program going to Stratford.
Leading the way in Dallas will be #3 Wichita State (Kan.), while fellow top-10 programs #5 McKendree (Ill.) and #10 Midland (Neb.) will join WSU there. William Penn is the fifth-best squad going to Dallas.
The Dallas sectional includes 16 teams. In addition to WPU and the three top-10 squads, the rest of the men’s field includes (alphabetically):
#24 Grand Canyon (Ariz.)
#28 Hastings (Neb.)
#47 Iowa Central CC
#49 Kansas Wesleyan
#73 Louisiana State
#56 Morningside
#77 UNLV
#12 Newman
#35 San Jose State
#65 Southwestern Christian (Okla.)
#46 Spring Hill (Ala.)
#42 West Texas A&M
Quincy Bruce (Sr., Cedar Rapids, Iowa, General Accounting) headlines the William Penn men with a 205.6 average.
On the women’s side, #1 Wichita State (Kan.) will guide the Dallas sectional, while #2 Lindenwood (Mo.) is the best team at Fairview Heights. #5 Robert Morris (Ill.) tops the Smyrna grouping, and #6 Wright State (Ohio) is first in the Stratford sectional.
Others in the 13-program tourney include (alphabetically):
#44 Baker (Kan.)
#62 Grand Canyon (Ariz.)
#17 Hastings (Neb.)
#49 Iowa Central CC
#14 McKendree (Ill.)
#13 Midland (Neb.)
#54 Morningside
#4 Newman (Kan.)
#58 Ottawa (Kan.)
#64 Spring Hill (Ala.)
#30 West Texas A&M
Bailey Palmer (So, Ottumwa, Iowa, Undecided) is WPU’s best female roller at 191.1.
Sectional assignments are based on Team Ranking System (TRS) points. Fields are determined by taking geographic distance, economics, and field size into consideration. To sort teams evenly throughout each sectional, the USBC attempts to place no more than two of the top eight schools and no more than four of the top 16 schools in a sectional based on final TRS totals.
The top four teams from each of the four sectionals advance to the Intercollegiate Team Championships, which will be held April 18-21 at Sun Valley Lanes in Lincoln, Neb.
The four sites will also host the Intercollegiate Singles Sectionals on March 9 with individuals bowling six games. The top 24 men and the top 24 women–top four from each sectional plus eight additional bowlers based on size of field at each location–advance to the National Singles Championship on April 17-18 and 21 in Lincoln.
