progress: SPORTS & EDUCATION Comet girls place 3rd at state; Comet boys break team pinfall record
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CHARLES CITY PRESS | WWW.CHARLESCITYPRESS.COM | TUESDAY, MARCH 25, 2025
By John Burbridge sports@charlescitypress.com The echoing sound of 10 pins being driven into the pit by a pocket-buried fi rst ball is about as unmistakenly distinct as the crack from a wooden bat sending a baseball to the out fi eld bleachers. But when a strike is thrown during a Baker Rotation-format team tournament where a lineup of fi ve bowlers alternate in order to throw two frames each during a single game, these reverberat- ing X sounds are often super- seded two- or three- or four-fold by the ruckus the team members make in celebration. At the Class 1A Girls Bowl- ing State Team Tournament, the Charles City Comets were par- ticularly loud and rowdy. And if any patrons at Cadillac Lanes in Waterloo – where the state tourney was held – complained to management about the Com- ets’ overzealous behavior, they would have been told the girls had reason to. Not only were the Comets cel- ebrating their strikes, they also put in much the same effort in celebrating their spare conver- sions – in particular their cor- ner-pin pickups. The Comets stuck around to compete in the four-team cham- pionship bracket after they were able to overcome a 60-pin de fi cit in claiming the fourth spot from Vinton-Shellsburg with just four games left in the pre-bracket
round. “All day long we worked hard and bowled great,” Comet girls head coach Casey Brandau said of her interchangeable state line- up of seniors. Isabel Crawford, Payton Had- ley and Darian Hesse; junior Kayla Streich; sophomore Kin- leigh Bahe; and freshman Alexis Putney eventually swept Inde- pendence three games to none in the best-of- fi ve third place matchup after the Comets forced a fourth game in the semi fi nal matchup against eventual state champion Camanche. “We stayed positive, we made our spares and we were great teammates cheering each other on and lending support when needed,” said Brandau, who was also impressed with the way her team maintained a 182 aver- age – higher than the Comets’ season Baker Rotation average – while bowling a grand total of 22 games during a course of more than fi ve-and-a-half hours. • THE COMET BOYS ALSO qual- i fi ed for the State Team Tourna- ment a week after they overcame a 210-pin de fi cit to catch and overtake Denver for the lone state-quali fi er berth at Comet Bowl. “That was one of the greatest comebacks in Charles City bowl- ing history,” said Doug Bohlen, whose comment may have some credibility as he has been the
Press photo by John Burbridge Charles City junior Sullivan Gerleman competes in the pre-bracket round of the Class 1A Bowling State Individual Tournament. He was the Comet boys’ lone individual state-quali fi er. Senior Payton Hadley was the Comet girls’ lone individual state-quali fi er.
Comet boys bowling coach since the program began in 2015. “I just changed the rotation a little … something we do in most every meet to keep things fresh,” Bohlen said of Com- ets’ malleable lineup consisting of senior Zach Putney, juniors Bryce Elsbury and Sullivan Gerleman, sophomores Joey Ro- bel and Noah White, freshman Cooper Holm and junior Jayden Lopez on hand as an alternate. “I think it was our cheering section that helped pull us through.” That cheering section, inci- dentally, consisted of members of the CC girls team, which had earned its berth the day before. The Comet boys were unable to secure any trophy hardware at the state tournament, but they did make history this season when they broke a team record with a pinfall of 3,410 while edging New Hampton during a regu- lar-season dual meet. It bested the previous mark (3,353) set during the 2019-20 season. For the state individual tourna- ment, senior Hadley and junior Gerleman were the Comets’ re- spective lone female and male quali fi ers.
Press photo by John Burbridge With head coach Casey Brandau, the Charles City Comet girls bowling team gathers for a photo after placing third at the Class 1A Girls Bowling State Team Tournament. State lineup included, front row from left to right, Kayla Streich, Alexis Putney and Isabel Crawford; back row, Darian Hesse, Kinleigh Bahe and Payton Hadley.
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