Black Hills wins 2A girls bowling state championship

The rules allow high school bowling teams to bring seven bowlers to major tournaments.

Black Hills coach Nicole Pocklington didn’t need to worry about leaving anyone behind. The Wolves had just six bowlers. They were enough.

Led by three top eight individual finishers, Black Hills won the 1A/2A state championship last weekend at Narrows Plaza Bowl in Tacoma with a total pinfall of 5,126.

Kaitlynn Gwinn was the Wolves top individual in third place while senior Hallie Stuart, who won the individual title as a sophomore, finished seventh and Zoey Theophilus eighth.

W.F. West’s Piper Chalmers was the individual champion with a score of 900 for four games.

Pocklington believed her team’s lack of depth was offset by experience.

“We had a real solid group of bowlers I’ve had for three or four years,” she said of a team that also included Kaylene Hall, Dana Culley and Bella Brady. “They’re the first group I’ve been able to coach from freshman year on.”

The bowlers, who managed to avoid any critical absences caused by COVID-19, found the compact group a plus.

“A lot of us have been together for a lot of years,” said Theophilus, a junior who followed her sister MacKenzie, now one of the top players on the team at Grand Canyon University, into the sport. “The small team got us closer.”

Gwinn agreed.

“We’re all good friends. We do a lot of things together outside of bowling,” she said. “When we came together for bowling, we were really able to work together toward our goals.”

Stuart pointed out players could get more one on one time with Pocklington. If they needed extra coaching. As luck would have it, Stuart and Pocklington are sisters, something she said she appreciated.

“It was cool,” Stuart said. “It’s nice to have my coach be someone I’ve known for a long time and not just a random person.”

Pocklington appreciated her sister’s resume and her efforts down the stretch at state.

“Winning state as a sophomore really built up Hallie’s confidence from being a baby bowler,” she said. “Her junior and senior years she really stepped up as a leader. We could always rely on her.”

With runner up Columbia River breathing down the Wolves’ necks during the final Baker games portion of state, where five bowlers for each team bowl a frame in order, Stuart came through bowling strikes on her final three balls.

“It was a great way to close out her high school career,” Pocklington said.

Stuart appreciated the chance to return to the podium as part of a winning team.

“Me having the name of ‘state champion’ probably made the rest of the team say ‘hey we want to do that, too,’ she said. “It was a crazy feeling when I won as a sophomore. Now I can say I’m a two-time state champion.”

Gwinn, who led the way this season, improved her score in each of her four individual games at state.

“I just had a really good day,” she said. “I made my adjustments well.”

Theophilus, also an all-conference softball pitcher, appreciated the way the Wolves stepped up on the biggest stage.

“We didn’t have the greatest time at Districts, but we really wanted to be the first team from Black Hills to win a state bowling championship.”

Interestingly, the biggest problem moving forward will be replacing the Wolves cadre of veteran players with persons yet unknown. Pocklington now teaches at River Ridge, limiting her chances to recruit on campus during the day.

Stuart, who plans to attend South Puget Sound Community College, will help out as a volunteer team manager and hopes to be able to attract players into the program.

Meanwhile, the Wolves weren’t the only local school to excel at state bowling.

In 4A, Olympia finished second behind Skyview as Brooke Johnson was sixth individually and Sawyer Jones eighth.

In 3A, Capital was sixth and North Thurston eighth. The top individual finisher from the South Sound Conference was Timberline’s Courtney Cahill in fourth. Capital’s Melanie Nguyen was seventh and North Thurston’s Novalee Robinson eighth.