Schoolcraft College’s men’s and women’s bowling teams wrapped up strong seasons with impressive results in the NJCAA* national bowling tournament.
The Schoolcraft men finished 10th nationally, with Alan Brown (26th) and Jared Stevens (29th) in the top 30. The Schoolcraft women placed 17th, led by Allison Little, who was 34th, and Rylan Owens, who was 45th.
“As a whole, the season was a success as we accomplished several of our goals, including winning our men’s home tournament and having multiple qualifiers, both men and women, for the national tournament,” said coach Patrick Yelsik. “Those were not easy to achieve given how competitive our conference has become.”
The 2019-20 campaign marked the 15th season Schoolcraft College has had a varsity bowling program, something the school has been a leader in.
“To give you an idea of how collegiate bowling has exploded in recent years, when I got here six years ago there were two schools in our conference that offered bowling as a varsity sport,” Yelsik said. “By the start of next year there will be 10. So the growth has been great, but competition is at an all-time high, which is a challenge that we are up for and look forward to.”
The showing at the national tournament was particularly impressive.
“Even though we have an extremely tough conference, we hadn’t seen competition like this all year,” Yelsik said. “These were the best bowlers at the two-year level from all over the Midwest and the East Coast, so it was certainly a success.”
The Schoolcraft College bowling program has a strong local flavor. Livonia, Northville, Canton, Plymouth, Westland, Farmington, Farmington Hills, Detroit, Southfield, Belleville, Clinton Township and Dearborn Heights all are represented on the rosters of the teams.
“We definitely put an emphasis on recruiting student-athletes from this area because the high school bowling in this area is as good and competitive as anywhere in the state,” Yelsik said. “We feel that if we can recruit this area and get the top bowlers from here on a consistent basis, it’ll put us in a position to be successful year-in and year-out.
“Plus all of the Livonia high schools also use Merri-Bowl as their home bowling center (same as Schoolcraft College), so it makes it easy and natural for me to be able to build relationships with those prospective student-athletes.”
With the season now in the record books, Yelsik now finds himself looking back a bit while also looking toward the future.
“This was a special group of young men and women that I was fortunate enough to be a part of this year,” he said. “It’s always hard to say goodbye to a group of sophomores that have meant so much to our program and helped get it to the point that it’s at. So we’re going to miss them immensely. But we’re also looking forward to next year, as we have a dynamic group of freshmen coming back. Pairing them with some of the incoming freshmen who will be here, I can’t help but to be excited to get started all over again.”
Following are Yelsik’s comments about each departing sophomore:
Jared Stevens / Westland / John Glenn
“Jared bowled for us two years ago and was a big part of our Regional Championship team that year, so we really leaned on him to be a de facto captain of this year’s squad. He bowled in our anchor spot pretty much the entire year and it was very fulfilling seeing all his hard work pay off with a spot in the national tournament, where he showed he more than belonged with the best of the best at our level.”
Kyle McCarthy / Westland / John Glenn
“It might sound kind of odd to say about a bowler, but Kyle is a freak of an athlete. He played multiple sports in high school and is the kind of student-athlete who would fit right in whether he was on the soccer pitch, football field or the bowling lanes. There aren’t too many people you can say that about. He’s a two-handed bowler with probably the highest ball speed of anyone that I’ve had in my six years. It says something when the bowlers from other teams would stop to watch when he was up.”
Payton Korhumel / Northville
“Small in stature but big in heart! Payton was a huge part of our successes both last year and this year, and it’s his work ethic that really sets his apart. No one worked as hard as Payton did in practice and seeing that carry over to the tournaments was awesome. He’s the kind of student-athlete who is going to be successful at whatever he decides to do!”
Andrew Licata / Farmington Hills / Farmington
“Andrew had some huge moments for us the last couple years, such as his performance last year in helping us win our home tournament even though we were under-manned. This year, he had a great performance at the regional tournament when he bowled multiple games over 200, including a 240. A lot of student-athletes will shy away from the bright lights, but that’s when Andrew was at his best.”
Jonah Machniak / Livonia / Franklin
“A fun fact about Jonah is that he didn’t bowl in high school, as his school didn’t have bowling as a sport when he was there. He’d been around the sport a lot though with his dad having the pro shop at our home lanes, so being a college bowler wasn’t too big of an adjustment for him. His improvement from last year to this year was pretty cool to see. He’s got an exceptional work ethic and attitude, and he’s only going to get better. As good as he did for us, his best bowling is still in front of him.”
Paige Harding / Belleville / St. Frances Cabrini
“Paige was the lone holdover from last year’s women’s team, and I don’t think I’ve ever been as proud of someone as I was with her. When some of the other would-be returners from last year’s team weren’t able to come back for a variety of reasons, it would have been real easy for Paige to follow suit and not come back with a team full of freshmen. But she took it upon herself to be a leader and a mentor to the younger bowlers on the team and they respected her a ton, which I think is one of the biggest compliments you can say about someone. She’s already prepping to stay around the sport competitively as she’s taken her leadership skills and returned to the high school ranks as a coach!”
*NJCAA stands for National Junior College Athletic Association