2016 NYSPHSAA Bowling Championships
Saturday, March -Sunday, March 6
Airport Lanes | Cheektowaga

Sachem and Columbia Win NYSPHSAA Bowling Titles in Dramatic Fashion
by Francis Boeck, Fromthe300level.com, NYSPHSAA Contributor

A long day of bowling at the Airport Lanes in Cheektowaga wrapped up with 2 great finishes and a spectacular performance by senior Nick Caruana from Section XI's Sachem.
Columbia (Section II) had been keeping the top spot in the Standings for the girls' side most of the day, but spots 2-4 were going back and forth. It was Union-Endicott (Section IV) who had the second spot after the first three games, with Union-Proctor (Section III) 14 pins behind and East Islip (Section XI) almost 1,000 pins behind second. However, in the afternoon games East Islip came back knocking about 200 more pins then they did in the morning and coming within 56 pins of Columbia. Union-Endicott ended the day in 3rd, 100 pins behind and Union-Proctor came up in 4th, 291 pins behind. Rachel Steel led the way for Columbia knocking down 1,243 pins in the 6 games, earning her the highest overall score of the day. Still in the 8th frame of the final game, the Girls State Bowling title was up for grabs until Columbia kept making strikes and spares while East Islip could not overcome their slow start.
Nick Caruana was no doubt the story on the boys' side. Caruana led the boys with the highest overall score of the day of 1,384 pins. Caruana got off to a slow start, but as the afternoon games came, the senior turned up the heat, with a score of 253 in game 5 and 263 in game 6. In game 6, he was on a roll, getting multiple strikes in a row. Luckily, for Sachem the senior was on their team. He helped them beat out Lansingburgh (Section II) who they were leading by 74 pins heading into the 6th frame. Thanks to performances by Caruana, Anthony Naujokas (2nd highest overall score of the day) and Bobby Ramsey (7th highest overall score of the day), Sachem was able to win the boys state title by 245 pins.
Tournament hosts Section VI fared well. Frontier boys' team got 4th place, 776 pins behind first and Orchard Park girls' got 7th place, 519 pins behind first.