After winning both the sectional and district tournaments, the Big Walnut Boys Bowling Team competes this coming Friday, March 8, in the State Boys Tournament. Conner Leidtke, a BW 2015 graduate, is the team’s coach. Although he coached the boys since 2019, he served as assistant until this school year. In high school, Leidtke bowled. During baseball season, he pitched and was third baseman. At the time, the bowling team was in its infancy at BW and really had no coach. That wasn’t true in baseball. The high schooler saw the positive difference a coach can make in the lives of his players on both school and travel teams. Now as a coach himself, he hopes to be a positive influence too.
Assistant coach Zach Green and Head coach Conner Leidtke
Leidtke received a bowling scholarship to the University of the Cumberlands where he studied science. After graduation, he moved back home. Currently, he works as a microbiological laboratory technician at the Wexner Medical Center.
At the bowling alley, Leidtke attempts to help the boys perfect their form and bowl as well as they are capable. He tries to help them cope positively with the rare gutter balls or with leaving pins. As one team member remarked, “When I get mad, I just get worse.” At practice, the boys seem relaxed. They kid around, have fun, and laugh, but from the results, they get the job done. At a recent practice, three of the team members bowled 300 in a Baker match. In competition, all five players have bowled over 200. The coach sees the team’s success as “the pieces falling into place.”
The assistant coach is Zach Green, another BW graduate, and the girls bowling team coach. When he started high school in 2008 at BW, bowling was a club, not a varsity sport. He bowled when a freshman and sophomore at the University of Northwestern Ohio. Green was a volunteer coach for four years, and this year is his first “official” season as a coach.
2023-2024 Big Walnut Boys Bowling
Team members are Dominic Bolton, Logan Doughty, Aiden Furukawa, Nick Green, Garrett Irvine, and Antonio Tucci. Coach Green confides, “Conner and I both said day one of this season that if any team can make it back to state and has a shot at holding that trophy, it’s this boys team.”
Live coverage of the state event Friday will be on Facebook at Big Walnut Eagles Bowling. It begins at 11:00 a.m. 2023-2024 Boys Bowling
Comments