BEAVERCREEK — With pressure mounting in the 10th frame, legs and arms a bit like Jell-O, Tyler Keck swing his Roto Grip Idol Helios bowling ball back beyond his right leg.
As he approached the foul line, Keck released the ball with what seemed to be his normal spin.
But immediately upon letting go of the ball, Keck’s heart sunk.
“I put my head down,” the Clinton-Massie senior said.
One strike from bowling’s perfect game, Keck believed his chance was gone. The ball spun down the lane further outside than normal. There’s no way, he thought in his mind, the 12th ball in his first game would reach the headpin.
Suddenly, the orange sphere took hold and churned its way to the pocket like a raging bull. Bowlers from several lanes on each side of Keck were zeroed in on lane 29 and Keck’s final ball of the first game.
The result was just like the previous 11. A strike. And a 300 game.
“That was lucky,” Keck said afterward. “The ball worked for me.”
And his teammates rushed the lanes.
“They all rallied around Tyler,” CM coach Tyler Hayslip said.
Keck achieved bowling’s single game pinnacle with the 300 during competition in the Division II Southwest District Bowling Championship tournament. He threw seven strikes to start the second game, before leaving a single pin in the 8th frame. He finished that game with 279.
“About the third frame … I’d never had that many strikes in a row before,” he said of his 19 straight one-ball frames. “I was thinking ‘What if (another 300)?’ I know it was a crazy thought but … .”
Keck finished the day with a 708 series and earned his first trip to the OHSAA Division II state tournament next week at Wayne Webb’s Columbus Bowl.
“300 never really came in to my mind,” Keck said. “I was just trying to shoot for 615 total because that’s what qualified (for state) last year.”
The 708 series put Keck on the district’s all-tournament team, the first such tournament honor in his illustrious career, Hayslip said.
Keck averaged 217 this season for the Falcons, which included a 276 game.
On Wednesday he surpassed that, using a ball he purchased less than a month ago.
“I just got the ball three weeks ago just for sectional, district … and state if we made it that far,” he said. “This was like the fifth match with it. It’s worked well.”
