DISTRICT NEWS & PR |
State champs: Collinsville girls bowling team honored with parad
February 17, 2010
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Elizabeth Donald
Belleville News Democrat
February 17, 2010 |
Bob Burg stood and applauded as his 15-year-old granddaughter and the rest of the bowling team lifted high their state championship trophy in the center of the high school gym.
Burg said their family once owned five bowling alleys throughout the metro-east, built by his father. Now granddaughter Amber Burns is the only freshman on the Collinsville High School bowling team, and her family was there to applaud her as they brought home the trophy.
The Collinsville girls bowling team is not only the state champion, but has the highest-scoring bowler in the state: Frannie Steiner, 17, of Collinsville. Frannie bowled a 229.7 average to win the medal Saturday in Rockford, finishing with three perfect strikes.
"It's a fairytale, really," Frannie said. "It's beyond anything I expected."
It's the first state championship for Collinsville High School since 1992, according to Superintendent Dennis Craft -- and the first state championship for a girls team in the history of the district. The team as a whole bowled 12,450, an average of 207.5.
"This is an exciting time for this high school of champions," Craft said.
In addition, Principal Eric Flohr said the Collinsville team bowled the highest number of pins in championship history. "We have the best-ever girls bowling team in the state of Illinois," he declared to cheers and applause during an assembly Tuesday in the crowded gymnasium.
Mayor John Miller told the school that "these girls have brought great honor to themselves and to their high school," but also to the city of Collinsville, he said. The team was honored with a parade from Camelot Bowl on Belt Line Road to the high school Tuesday afternoon.
"We know, and I know, that a lot of times a sport like bowling gets overlooked," said coach Sean Hay. "But no matter what sport or activity you're in, if you put in the kind of effort these ladies did, you're going to be successful, no matter what."
Six of the team members are seniors, so most of the team will change over by next year. Frannie said she is considering both McKendree University and Southern Illinois University Edwardsville after she graduates this spring.
One factor that might decide it, she said: McKendree has a bowling team.
Contact reporter Elizabeth Donald at edonald@bnd.com or 659-0985.
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