USA Bowling – U15/U12 Baker

Update 8/1/2019: The USA Bowling Coastal South regional tournament is scheduled for 1/4/20-1/5/20 at Aloma Bowl in Winter Park.  If this tournament interests you, please see the “Baker Bash” Tournament page — this season the First Coast USBC is holding a tournament that closely resembles the USA Bowling regional tournament, giving local bowlers the opportunity to experience this tournament without making a trip or overnight stay!

What is “USA Bowling – U15/U12 Baker”?

USBC/IBC introduced a new tournament concept to certain youth bowlers in 2013, where teams of bowlers compete against each other in the “Baker” format.  In its simplest definition, the Baker format means that each bowler take turns in a rotation, throwing one complete frame at a time.  Colleges and universities, and even some high school associations, use the Baker format for their non-individual competition.

There are only 16 USA Bowling Regional Tournament events, where Under-15 (U15) and Under-12 (U12) teams can enter.  Teams play 8 head-to-head Baker games against other teams in their age division, with the higher scoring team earning a Win while the other team earns a Loss.  Each team’s Win-Loss record determines placement / seeding in the Brackets round.  The Brackets Round consists of double-elimination match play, with each match being a best-of-three-games format.

Each regional tournament winning team (for each age division) earns entry into the USA Bowling National Tournament, which takes place in July immediately before the start of the Junior Gold National Championships.  Because of the prestigious nature of this tournament, many teams will travel out of state to compete in the regional events.

In 2018, the First Coast USBC fielded several teams at the Coastal South Regional (in Orlando) but did not repeat as champions.  The “Pocket Pounders” U15 team later entered the Mountain Regional event and won, advancing to the National tournament.  This team finished in 8th place, an improvement over the prior year’s performance.

In 2017, both champions (U12 & U15) of the Coastal South Regional were teams from the First Coast USBC!  We had 4 teams competing in one of the largest regional tournament fields: “Beach Bowlzinga XL” won the U12 division out of 4 teams; “Pocket Pounders” won the U15 division out of 11 teams. “Ringing Ten-Pins” finished in 4th, and “Beach Bowl Pin Destroyers” finished in 11th.  Both teams competed in the National Championship Event against 15 other teams in their respective divisions… but did not advance to the televised finals.

Back in January 2016, 3 teams from the First Coast USBC competed in the Coastal South Regional Tournament, the second-largest turnout of all the USA Bowling regional tournaments.  The Jacksonville U15 All-Stars made it into the Championship Bracket but finished in 7th out of 14 U15 teams.  Team Bowlzinga (U12) finished in 5th out of 8 U12 teams. The Jacksonville U12 All-Stars went undefeated in the qualifying round, but finished in 2nd place in the Brackets round to “Team Georgia” (who went on to place 2nd in the National Championships).

This sounds interesting… who do I contact?

Send an e-mail to fcusbcyouth@gmail.com or ask your coach for more information.

Note: The Challenge Tournament incorporated the Baker format last year to give bowlers the opportunity to try it out!