The Norwin Knights Bowling teams kicked off their seasons on December 3rd, led by a new head coach, Jack Momeyer. The previous coach, Coach Siegel, had his daughters graduate last year and wanted to watch them bowl in college; thus, opening the door for a new bowling coach.
“I took over the role to make sure we had someone who was a bowler and knew what they were doing,” said Momeyer about being hired as new coach. “I have been bowling since I was 8 years old.”
The Bowling Teams are off to a fresh start and look forward to a competitive season.
Norwin Girls Bowlers:
After finishing 4th in the state last year, the Norwin Girls Bowling team returns for another season. The girls have a lot of positions to fill after last year’s top three girls graduated.
The girls finished the 2024-2025 season top of the Southwest section in the Western Pennsylvania Interscholastic Bowling League (WPIBL) with an undefeated 10-0 section record.
The Girls Bowling team, however, lost 3 of their top bowlers from last season, and now looks to new bowlers to lead the team this year.
“Raeana Bruce and Kenzie Tatters are my top 2 bowlers, but we have newcomers this year in Laura Madden and Kaitlyn Tudor who are going to definitely contribute to the team,” said Momeyer.
The girls learned a lot from the seniors last year and hope to use that advice to help them grow throughout the year.
“A thing I learned from the girls who were serious last year was that it’s okay if you have a bad game, but it’s important to not get in your head about it,” said sophomore Kenzie Tatters. “This has been a little reminder in my head because it’s a big thing that can really ruin your game mentality.”
Speaking of mentality, the girls understand the importance of mentally preparing themselves for their matches.
“Depending on which bowling alley we bowl at, I think back to times when I’ve bowled there before, so I know what to expect with the lanes,” said Raeana Bruce.
The girls have high goals of improving throughout the season.
“For this year, I want to grow more as a bowler, and I want to get more higher scores, which has already been happening and helping my average,” said Tatters.
Post-Season
Following a second place finish in their section, the Norwin Girls bowling team made the WPIBL playoffs. The girls team, finished the season 7-3 with a team average of 650.8 pins a game. The team average represents the sum of the individual scoring averages of the top 4 players that round.
The girls team will compete at the WPIBL Girls Team Championships on Thursday, February 12th at the AMF Lanes in Mount Lebanon.
Along with leading their team to the team playoffs, three bowlers: Raeana Bruce, Kenzie Tatters, and Laura Madden qualified for the WPIBL Girls Singles Championships that take place on Thursday, February 19th. All three girls averaged over 130 pins a game, with Raeana Bruce leading with a team average of 164.6.
Norwin Boys Bowlers:
The Norwin Boys bowlers finished the 2024-2025 season 4th in the WPIBL Southwest section with a 4-6 record.
The boys’ team looks to improve throughout the year.
“We have a relatively young team in experience-wise wise even though I do have a lot of seniors on the team, but I have a lot of first-time bowlers, so we’re working with them to get their averages up,” said Momeyer.
The boys have many things they want to work on to get better, including consistency.
“Last year, we were all pretty inconsistent, and so this season we’re all trying to get more consistent and improve our averages,” said junior Jaxson Momeyer.
“I want to improve on my consistency and like adapting to the lanes because they change a lot between lanes, and since you bowl across 2 lanes, they aren’t always the same, so you have to adapt,” said senior Jonah Stashko.
“We definitely need to work on picking up our spares we missed. We missed a lot of 1-pin spares on the first two matches, and I think if we can do that we’ll really be able to compete with anybody in our section,” said Coach Momeyer.
Post Season
Two members of the Norwin Boys Bowling team qualified for the WPIBL Boys Singles Championships. Russel Del Signore, who averaged 170.3 pins a game over the regular season, along with Jonah Stashko, who averaged 171.5 pins a game both will compete at the championship on February 18th.
Since last year, the bowling team has grown and hopes to continue growing.
“This year, we have 7 girls and 15 guys,” said Momeyer.
The bowling team is a great way to get involved in the school during the wintertime and make new friends and compete.
“Anyone can come out, it’s a lot of fun. It doesn’t matter if you’ve bowled for years or never bowled before; we can work with you and get you better. It’s a nice experience for the kids,” said Momeyer.
