The pinnacle of the girls bowling season took place on Friday and Saturday at Century Bowl in Waterford Twp. On Friday, the team championships were held. Each team would bowl eight baker games followed by two traditional games with five bowlers bowling each game. The top eight of the sixteen team field would move into match play to determine a state champion. Early on it was a struggle for the Redhawks.with games of 143 and 135, they had a hole to dig out in the eleventh position. The next two games were 185 and 136, which helped some along with the scores being on the low side for most teams, but left Marshall in eleventh after four games. Games six and seven, 134 and 166 left the Redhawks in thirteenth and things were looking pretty bleak. The final two baker games brought a great improvement with games of 214 and 168 vaulting the Redhawks into seventh as they moved into individual games.
In the first individual game, the Redhawks found a groove with a team score of 818. Stephanie Sobaski had a 156 and Zoey Stone had 139. Ember Boughton had 168, while Summer Stone turned in a 189 to go with Olivia Stone's 166. A very solid game that kept Marshall in the mix in eighth position.
The final game was a 798. Stephanie Sobaski had a 165 with Zoey Stone following her with a 135. Ember Boughton had a 162 while Summer Stone had a 170 and Olivia Stone had another 166. While shooting 798 is generally pretty solid in the world of girls high school bowling, on this particular day, it wasn't enough. The Redhawks dropped to tenth in the standings, 81 pins shy of the cut for match play. While it was short of the ultimate goal, this team scored 60 pins higher on the day than the 2024 team did when they made the cut. In fact in three state trips to the state finals, the Marshall girls have improved each year. That sets the bar for 2026. Sometimes when you bowl well, you just get beat. That was the case on Friday.
On Saturday, Summer Stone returned for the singles championships. Summer's regional scores were third highest among the 56 bowlers that qualified. However, Summer was thrown a curve ball earlier in the week as she battled illness that limited her practice. Undeterred, she was ready to go. Out of the gate she was solid with a 182 before hitting a pair of lanes that gave her fits and resulted in a 136. Knowing that she had a lot of ground to make up, but four games to do it, Stone stayed positive and went to work. She turned in games of 205, 194 and 187 before rounding out with another 205. Her highlight of the day was converting the 4-6-7-9-10 split, also known as the Greek Church. That is, statistically, the most uncommon conversion in all of bowling, even less often than the 7-10 split.
In the end, Stone knew things would be close, but never dreamed that the final match play spot would be taken by a bowler with a pintotal of 1110, her was 1109. She missed the cut by a single pin to finish seventeenth (singles takes the top sixteen to match play). While disappointing to miss, especially by such a close margin. Stone has had a fantastic season, as has the team. Looking at the season as a whole, Stone won three singles tournaments, placed second at regionals and competed very well at state, finishing seventeenth. The team won two tournaments, placed third in another, won the conference, placed second at regionals and wrapped their season with a ton of respect at the state tournament (the third consecutive trip). They also finished in the top ten for the second consecutive season. For perspective, Michigan has the largest high school bowling tournament in the country. The top two divisions are especially competitive, these ladies have a LOT to hang onto when they reflect upon this season.
