D4's Best Survive Close Final Matches
March 2, 2013
By Jon Malavolti
Special to Second Half
STERLING HEIGHTS – Vandercook Lake’s Malloree Ambs and Rogers City’s Bailey Budnik outlasted the competition Saturday at Sunnybrook Golf and Bowl to be crowned the MHSAA’s Division 4 bowling girls and boys singles champions, respectively.
Ambs, who defeated Oscoda sophomore Paige Huebel 375-361 in the final, was a champion for the second straight day after her Jayhawks took the girls team title Friday.
Budnik, meanwhile, fended off Jeffery Green of Burton Bentley 336-322 in an all-freshman final on the boys side.
The back-to-back days of bowling certainly didn’t slow Ambs down, yet she wasn’t necessarily planning on lasting so long. Her freshman year she advanced to the round of 16, and then on to the quarterfinals her sophomore season. So this year she said she had simply hoped to make the semifinals.
“But I got through that and made it to the finals,” she noted. “It means a lot."
Huebel exceeded her own expectations as well.
“I think it’s very awesome,” she said of reaching the final. “I didn’t even come here expecting that, but I’m really happy.”
Back on the boys side, the freshmen Finals competitors weren’t exactly sure what to expect. But that didn’t stop them from excelling.
“I’m really excited,” Budnik said. “It’s a really great honor. I must have just got lucky or something; I don’t know. The lane switching was hard to get at first, then just keeping myself from not cracking under the pressure and just taking it one stop at a time and clearing my mind.”
Green was grateful for his success, and anxious to apply the lessons learned on the day toward the future – and perhaps another run at an MHSAA title.
“It is very exciting, but it was very nerve-wracking also,” he said.
The exciting competitive drama for the day wasn’t limited to the final round.
Qualifying on the boys side was especially close. Even after six games apiece, six bowlers just missed moving on to the knockout stages by fewer than eight pins. And there was a tie for the 16th and final spot in qualifying, meaning Madison Heights Bishop Foley sophomore Michael Maruszczak and Muskegon Western Michigan Christian senior Austin Sandin would compete in a tie-breaker game. Maruszczak eventually emerged victorious.
The girls competition was tight as well, featuring a roll-off on additional ninth and 10th frames in the quarterfinals between Unionville-Sebewaing senior Kaitlin Gunsell and Vandercook Lake junior Jessica Bunch. Gunsell rolled three straight strikes to best Bunch 60-47 and advance to the semifinals, where she fell to Ambs.
Ambs becomes the first girls bowler to win singles and team championships in the same season since 2010 when Kara Richard and Tecumseh completed the achievement in Division 2.
It certainly helps to practice against some of the best competition in the state, as a pair of Ambs’ team title-winning teammates also advanced as far as the singles quarterfinals Saturday – Bunch and senior Becky Cecil.
“It feels pretty good to know that all the hard work we do during practices and all the coaching that we have helps,” Ambs said. “It pushes us a lot.”
Click for full girls results and full boys results.
PHOTOS: (Top) Vandercook Lake's Malloree Ambs prepares to roll during Saturday's Individual Finals. (Middle) Rogers City's Bailey Budnik finished as boys champion Saturday at Sterling Heights. (Click to see more at HighSchoolSportsScene.com.)
With Only Championship Step Left to Take, Reid Ready to Earn Every Pin
By
Paul Costanzo
Special for MHSAA.com
December 6, 2023
Before she was big enough to properly hold a bowling ball, Hannah Reid was spending countless hours at the lanes.
At the former Town and Country Lanes, which was run by her grandmother, Reid would hold the ball with both hands near her chest, and toss it down the lane with all the might in her 3-year-old body. But it better have stayed out of the gutter.
“Never used bumpers,” said her father, Mike Reid. “She had to earn every pin.”
The Flushing senior has continued to earn every pin for the past 15 years, and this past season, it led to an unlikely run to the Division 1 Bowling Singles Final championship match. She finished runner-up, which just means there’s more pins to knock down and one more step to take.
“I have a lot more confidence, but it’s also scary,” she said, “because the only way I can get better is being the state champion. But I have to push for that.”
It’s a lot to ask of herself, but so was overcoming the odds to get to the title-deciding match a year ago.
Reid was bowling in her first Finals tournament and found herself outside the top 16 after the first four games of the qualifying block. She closed with a 207 and 217 in the final two games to sneak in as the 16th seed by two pins.
“I struggled in the first part of the game,” she said. “But once the lanes transitioned, I transitioned with them in a good way.”
Even then, Reid was facing long odds, facing No. 1 seed Melanie Straub of New Baltimore Anchor Bay in the first round. Straub had dominated qualifying, finishing 54 pins ahead of the second seed. But after the first game, Reid trailed by only six pins. She caught up and pulled away in the second to pull off a massive upset.
“I think she probably surprised herself more than anyone,” Flushing bowling coach Jeremy Jurvelin said. “Once she beat (Straub), it definitely became more on her radar that she could make a run for the Finals.”
Reid did just that, winning her next two matches before her Cinderella run came to a close in the championship match against Clarkston’s Katie Stephens.
“That was one heck of a run,” said Mike Reid, a volunteer coach for Flushing who handles the girls program. “It was awesome. It’s still a tear-jerker, especially with how close she came to being a state champion, which is huge. Hopefully, we can make that run again. But I don’t like that 16 seed. Top five would be great.”
Mike Reid has been there every step of the way in Hannah’s bowling journey, from those days when she was two-hand pushing a ball down the lane, to now, when she’s entered her senior season having already signed to bowl collegiately at Lawrence Tech and is bowling some of the best games of her life.
She bowled her high series – 734 – during a rec league match in late November. That came one day after her dad rolled a 733.
It wasn’t a direct victory over Dad, but it was a victory. And Dad was OK with it.
“It’s still kind of cool that she topped me by one pin the next day,” he said. “Maybe one day she’ll get to my 857. I can’t wait until she gets her first 300 game.”
Hannah very nearly did get that perfect game a year ago. She bowled a 287 on Jan. 8 in a tournament at Richfield Bowl in Flint. As she neared the end, all eyes started to turn toward her. Going through that, she said, was more nerve-racking than competing in the Division 1 Final.
Perhaps that helped as she recently won an Under-18 Michigan Junior Masters Association tournament in Westland. It took a comeback in her semifinal, which she wound up winning by one pin, to pull it off.
“It’s not over until it’s over,” she said, which may be cliche, but fitting of her record in the biggest bowling tournaments of her life.
Reid opened her high school season with 248 and 204 games to lead her team to a win against Goodrich.
This year’s Flushing team returns every bowler from a year ago and has a chance to qualify for the Team Final for the first time since 2020.
Having strong teammates to push her has only driven Reid more this season.
“During practice, we do different drills and competitions,” she said. “So winning those competitions sets you up for everything.”
Paul Costanzo served as a sportswriter at The Port Huron Times Herald from 2006-15, including three years as lead sportswriter, and prior to that as sports editor at the Hillsdale Daily News from 2005-06. He can be reached at [email protected] with story ideas for Genesee, Lapeer, St. Clair, Sanilac, Huron, Tuscola, Saginaw, Bay, Arenac, Midland and Gladwin counties.
PHOTOS (Top) Flushing’s Hannah Reid shows off her Division 1 Final runner-up medal last season with coach Jeremy Jurvelin, left, and father and coach Mike Reid. (Middle) By third grade, Hannah Reid already had fallen in love with bowling. (Photos courtesy of the Reid family.)