The Newsmagazine of Long Beach Island and Southern Ocean County

By David Biggy | on July 27, 2022

GOING PLACES: With an eye on someday turning pro, Barnegat’s Joe Spagnola soon will be spinning his ball down the lanes at the renowned Kegel Training Center with the Webber International University bowling squad. (Supplied Photo)

Heading into his freshman year at Barnegat High School four years ago, Joe Spagnola had no interest in bowling.

“I was a wrestler. I thought bowling was dumb,” said Spagnola, who on Sunday returned home from a long stay in Grand Rapids, Mich., after placing 21st overall in the United States Bowling Congress  Junior Gold Championships. “My mom forced me to bowl with my sister that winter, and I learned how to make the ball curve, which I thought was cool.”

While sister Lily already had established herself with the Bengals’ girls squad, Ocean Lanes instructor Tony Belillo literally got Joe hooked on bowling. Now a BHS graduate, Spagnola is on his way to Webber International University in Florida, where he intends to bowl for the Warriors under famed coach Del Warren.

“Webber’s a different level of bowling. I’ll be happy to make the JV team to start out,” he said. “I believe I can make the team, but varsity is another thing. The main thing is that I keep improving as a player, and going varsity will take care of itself.”

In the meantime – he doesn’t have to be at Webber until Aug. 8 – Spagnola has done a lot to prepare himself for the grind of collegiate level bowling by competing in as many events as possible during recent months, the Storm Youth Championship series and other USBC sanctioned tournaments among them.

Spagnola took second in an SYC event in Iowa in May and competed in another SYC tournament in Ohio last month. The 18-year-old two-hander – he started off as a single-hand bowler before he was turned on to the two-handed style by former BHS teammate David MacGillivray – also won the USBC New Jersey Youth State Tournament and took third in the USBC New Jersey Youth Pepsi Tournament.

EYES FORWARD: Joe Spagnola is looking forward to bowling at the collegiate level, and he’s been competing in some major national tournaments in preparation for it. (Photo by David Biggy)

During the week leading up to the Junior Gold tourney, Spagnola finished seventh in the USBC Youth Open Championship. But then the big one arrived on July 20, along with another 1,200 bowlers, and Spagnola got off to a really hot start, posting initial scores of 258-218-266-191 for a 933 block and settling into the third position after the first round.

With a second-round block of 820 with scores of 229, 192, 189 and 210, Spagnola slipped to ninth overall but was still cruising at a 219 average through the first day of competition. On July 21, he vaulted into the second position behind Carter Street of Dublin, Ohio, with an awesome 968 block, the second-highest third-round series, with scores of 279, 247, 223 and 219.

With a fourth block of just 774, following scores of 178, 157, 199 and 240, Spagnola dropped back to the eighth spot, but he was only 59 pins behind Gregorio Sicard III, who sat in fourth – the cutoff position to earn a spot on Team USA’s Youth World Championship squad – and still holding an average just above 218.

“My goal was to make the top 16 for match play, and I was cruising toward that through the first four qualifying rounds,” he said. “But my last round of qualifying ended really late, and I was part of the first group for the first Advancers round, which started at 7:30 a.m. the next day. I only had about four hours of sleep and I was exhausted, and the nerves were kicking in.”

ON THE RISE: Joe Spagnola has spent a vast majority of the spring and summer playing in big events, including the USBC Youth Open in Michigan earlier this month. (Supplied Photo)

During the five-game block of Advancer Round 1 on July 22, Spagnola’s position tanked following games of 164, 180, 205, 176 and 116. Despite the 841 set, Spagnola was in 37th and moved on to the Final Advancers Round, during which he fired games of 190, 215, 170, 258 and 185 to finish 21st overall with a 5,354 total, 48 pins out of 16th, averaging 205.92.

Last year, Spagnola finished 371st with an average of 182.32 through the four-block qualifying stage.

“During the qualifying rounds, I missed two makeable spares – a 3-pin and a 10-pin – and I know exactly why I missed them,” he said. “The oil pattern changed for the first Advancers round, and I just didn’t play the pattern right. In the Final Advancers round, I did what nobody else was doing. I threw all the way to the first board and it was scary, hugging the gutter like that, but it worked really well. Considering I dropped from second to 37th, to bring it back to 21st, I’m happy with how I finished that block.”

Before heading to Webber to play inside the renowned Kegel Training Center, Spagnola will play one more tournament, in Maryland.

“Bowling the past few months has been fun,” he said. “Going to tournaments, seeing some familiar faces, grinding it out … it’s been good. I’m looking forward to what’s ahead of me at Webber and improving as a bowler.”

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