Considering the Minooka boys bowling team has been holding up to their excellent skill level for several years, it was no big surprise that the team came into another invitational match with great confidence to prove themselves worthy.

The Minooka Invitational on Dec. 3 was another match the boys dominated for the win. They placed 1st at the tournament, with Zach Kunkle placing 7th individually, Spencer Bruinsma placing 3rd, and D.J. Singleton went on a bowling rampage to take home the 1st place individually.

Head coach Derrick Rapsky said his athletes are starting to ramp up their gameplay performance after a rather sluggish start to the season. After the boys won the Minooka Invite by 40 pins, they will continue to come into future games with the same confidence the boys had in themselves coming into that invitational.

“We’ve been really climbing the hill here now and really have been having a lot of success lately. We started off a little slow, but we’re making great progress,” Rapsky said.

He expects his team to keep the pace going.

Spencer Bruinsma, who placed 3rd at the tournament, said the invitational day was an awesome day for the team, they scored well enough to win and overall worked really well together as a team.

“Winning our own invitational is always fun, especially when it was a close match between us and the second place team,” Bruinsma said.

Bruinsma said the team overall really had a good weekend and experience playing and winning that invitational, with the team hanging on to their 1st place position with a close call from the 2nd place team, really came down to a nail biter.

The most important team member for this invitational match easily was D.J. Singleton. He placed 1st in the match by 30 pins, staying well ahead of the team. He averaged a score of 231.5 throughout the four baker style team games that were played for the invitational tournament.

“Pretty much everyone bowled well, Zach, Spencer and I were individual medalists in that match with me being fortunate enough to come home with the win individually,” Singleton said.

Singleton was relieved and proud of himself for knowing that he made his team win it all that day. Winning the tournament by 30 pins ahead of everyone else really said something different about him. He really hopes that he can stay that way and prove his worth to the team and his coaches exactly like he did, especially in bigger and more important games like the invitational.