Strike! Well maybe not without practice, but practice makes perfect, right?

With a high school bowling team, practice would definitely be necessary. Why? You would have to compete against other area schools. For Beaver Area, that may be schools like Blackhawk, Beaver Falls, Ambridge, New Castle, and Hopewell—all of whom have bowling teams who compete at local lanes. Bowling would be a competitive sport in the winter.

Now I understand that high school bowling teams may not sound very popular, but they offer amazing benefits.

High school bowling teams offer sports opportunities to a wider range of students. For sports like football, volleyball, soccer, basketball, and cross country or track you have to be much more physically fit to participate, but with a bowling team that isn’t really an issue. There really isn’t any extreme fitness requirement to be met for joining a high school bowling team.

Additionally, having your own equipment, like your own bowling ball and bowling shoes, is helpful before joining a high school team, but it is not required because most bowling alleys have house bowling balls that you can use and will provide shoe rentals. Therefore, excessive expense really isn’t an issue either when joining a bowling team.

Also consider that bowling alleys are more popular than most people would think. We would have multiple options for home lanes within the area. For example we could use Baden Bowl, Sims Lanes, or Center Lanes. And startup costs for a new bowling team is minimal as well—the cost of shirts and group lane rental.

While we are on the topic of money, let’s discuss scholarship opportunities. Many people are surprised to learn that colleges with bowling teams award large sums of scholarship money to some high school bowlers, but there is also a downfall regarding scholarships. The downfall being that most colleges that offer bowling scholarships don’t recruit. Which means that getting the attention of most colleges requires a bit of work.

To be recognized for bowling skill, sending videos of yourself bowling to college programs will most benefit you. However, since bowling scholarships are not very popular compared to marquee sports like football or basketball, colleges can award more money to scholarships recipients. According to the “2015-2016 High School Guide Book” on nfhs.org, more than $6 million in scholarships are provided each year to high school students on bowling teams. Yes, you read that correctly: $6 million.

While high school bowling teams may not seem very popular, that doesn’t mean that bowling isn’t popular. Again, the “2015-2016 High School Guide Book” says, “Seventy million people, young and old, bowl each year; 18 million Americans age 17 and under bowl each year.” If that many people bowl each year, then why haven’t we already considered starting a bowling team? By taking that statistic and combining it with the other benefits of having a high school bowling team it seems like a no-brainer to me.

So, tie up those laces and lets hit the lanes.