Bearkats second seed in Sunday bracket action
10/18/2015 7:45:00 AM | Women's Bowling
Led by Heather Penatzer and Janine Kuwahara, Sam Houston enters Sunday best-of-seven bracket play seeded second at the Allstate Sugar Bowl Collegiate Classic in Kenner, La.
Penatzer and Kuwahara posted the top two individual total pins averages Saturday in traditional team play with marks of 214.33 pins and 213.83 pins per match, respectively. Their Bearkat teammates, Anna Groce and Erin Brown ranked 12th and 21st with averages of 201.0 and 193.75.
No. 2 ranked Arkansas State, the only team to defeat the No. 6 rated Kats in traditional team play Saturday, is the top seed Sunday. ASU is 10-1 in the tournament with a team total pins average of 201.4.
Sam Houston stands 8-3 for the event and holds a 198.2 team mean. No. 5 Vanderbilt (7-4) is third with a 194.5 average followed by No. 2 Stephen F. Austin (9-2, 191.5) and No. 1 Nebraska (7-5, 188.9).
The Bearkats opened play Saturday with a 972 to 863 win over Vandy. Sam Houston continued its dominance of the Southwestern Athletic Conference with consecutive traditional team victories of 970 to 898 over Prairie View A&M, 1,046 to 803 versus Alabama State and 1,015 to 687 against Southern.
Arkansas State edged the Bearkats 1,035 to 991 to complete the day's action.
The event is the first of Sam Houston's sixth season of competition in women's bowling. Fridy, the Kats opened play with a 996 to 841 victory over No. 3 Stephen F. Austin and a 941 to 928 win over No. 1 Nebraska in total pin-fall five-game Baker matches.
The Bearkats lost to Jackson State 1,018 to 906, defeated Texas Southern 1,024 to 757 and No. 10 ranked North Carolina A&T 988 to 917 before falling in a rematch with SFA 1,076 to 1,057 to complete Friday's action.
The Bearkats have won the Tulane tournament two of the last three years. A total of 15 teams are competing in the three-day event at the AMF Allstar Lanes in Kenner. Ten of the teams are nationally ranked including five of the top six teams in the preseason rankings.
