We've been asked on many occasions, what is the strongest men's bowling league in the area for the 2006-07 season?

                                                                                                                     After checking with many bowlers and looking at the various standings sheets, we've come to the conclusion that it is the Howie Havlish Classic which competes on Fri (6:30pm) at Westside Lanes in West St. Paul.

         The 18 team league has 93 bowlers who have bowled 18 games or more with 59 of them having an average of 200 or better.  There are six women competing in the league. In addition there are six bowlers with averages between 195 and 199.

        Setting the pace in averages is Dave Lutz with a 228 average. Dave Mitchell of Farmington,who won the all events at last years ABC/USBC tournament, is runnerup with a 224 mark.  Lutz has competed in 51 games and Mitchell in 78.

    

         Rounding out the top five, all with 220 marks, are Dennis Bradley (72 games), Mike Wasmund (78) and Tom Havlish (75).

        Mitchell leads the league in high series with a pair of 800 totals, 826 and 806.  Bob Neubauer has an 809 and Jason Wagner a 795.  Bradley, Mitchell and Wasmund all have posted a 300 game, along with Tom Gallivan, Wagner and Dan Lang. The league also has four State Hall of Famers. Roger Blad, Jim Lindquist, Gary Green and Mike Schmid.

         There has been a rumor that two leagues in the Mpls. area might be the strongest.  They compete at Texa Tonka and New Hope Lanes.  We'd be interested in hearing from someone in those leagues

NEWSPAPER IS DISCRIMINATORY

         The Pioneer Press, the only major newspaper in the capital city of St. Paul, claims it is not discriminatory.  We beg to differ.

                 For the past three years it has failed to put the standings of four major tournaments in the paper.  We're referring to the Men's and Women's State meets and the St. Paul Men's and Women's City meets.

         In addition to those meets, it has also skipped several other top notch meets held throughout the state.  We're referring to the Alexandria Classic, American Legion, State Eagles, State Elks, Knights of Columbus and VFW tournaments.

         There are close to 200,000 male and fenmale bowlers (all USBC sanctioned) and another 15 to 20,000 youth bowlers in the state who compete in these various meets.

         Another major meet which the paper refuses to publish the scores of is the annual Men's and Women's USBC Tournaments. Thankfully it is being covered by mnbowling website.

          The paper did publish the scores of those various meets we mentioned since the 1920's.

         The Pioneer Press does publish the standings of three tournaments, all rather small meets with entries from 25 to 75.  They are the ABT (Amateur Bowlers Tour), CBA (Central Bowlers Alliance) and the MSC (Midwest Senior Classic).

        The bowlers can help themselves by emailing interim publisher Fred Mott, editor and vise president Thom Fladung or executive sports writer Mike Bass.