Carroll bowlers save best for girls state championship

Before talking about his team’s dominance, Carroll bowling coach Ron Horsch looked at his assistant and wanted him to be interviewed, too.

“It’s all of us,” Horsch said.

That held true Friday as Carroll showed its team depth in winning the Class 5-1A girls bowling championship. The Eagles finished with 3,115 pins, 296 more than runner-up Shawnee Heights. It was the Eagles’ highest team series all season.

The Eagles placed three bowlers in the top seven individual finishers, and though Carroll’s top finisher, Laura Seiler, finished third, the sum outweighed the parts.

Salina South’s Lauren Lust took the individual title; the Cougars finished third in the team race. Shawnee Heights’ Cayla Bortz finished second; the Thunderbirds finished second.

“We just kept bowling and kept building all year,” Horsch said. “That was their motto all season.”

Seiler, a junior, finished with a 653-pin series. She would have finished first by more than 30 pins with that score in 2017.

Sophomore Alexandria Carter bowled a 622-pin series. That would have taken first last year, too. She finished fifth.

And junior Ryleigh Chaffin finished with 572 pins. She placed seventh. Horsch, who won his first coaching title, said the girls’ performance was nothing but “incredible.”

With the girls’ first-place finish, Carroll wrapped up its bowling season with an individual champion, boys’ Dillon Malone, and two team trophies after the boys finished third.

Horsch said to take a group with so many accomplished bowlers after the girls competition was special.

“I’m really speechless and very grateful,” he said. “The boys and girls practice together, and they feed off of each other. That helped today.”

This story was originally published March 2, 2018 at 5:23 PM with the headline "Carroll bowlers save best for girls state championship."