Team USA wins team, sweeps all-events at PABCON

Lucas Wiseman

September 16, 2014

CALI, Colombia - Team USA dominated the field to win the team gold medal, swept the all-events medals and qualified for the 2015 Pan American Games on Tuesday in an eventful day at the 2014 Pan American Bowling Confederation Women's Championships.

Team USA took the lead by nearly 150 pins after the first game of team event and never looked back en route to a record-breaking six-game total of 6,738 at the Cali Bowling Coliseum. Canada took the silver with 6,301, and Mexico earned the bronze with 6,195.

Missy Parkin led the way for the United States with 1,452 and was followed by Liz Johnson (1,375), Kelly Kulick (1,341), Shannon O'Keefe (1,261), Shannon Pluhowsky (664) and Danielle McEwan (645).

Not only did the United States win the event by 428 pins, it also broke its own PABCON Women's Championships record of 6,713 set in 2012.

"We bowled amazing and it was just incredible," Parkin said. "We were really good at communicating with each other and keeping up with the moves, which was important because the lanes were changing quickly."

Parkin set a record of her own as she blew past the all-events record with a 24-game total of 5,515 (229.79 average). Kulick, who won the silver with 5,426, held the previous all-events record of 5,463, set in 2008. Johnson took the bronze medal with 5,354 to complete the Team USA sweep.

The top eight players in the all-events standings advanced to Wednesday's final event, the match-play Masters. The Masters will consist of three rounds of best-of-three match play to determine the medalists.

O'Keefe qualified fourth, Clara Guerrero of Colombia was fifth, Sandra Gongora of Mexico was sixth, McEwan was seventh and Aumi Guerra of the Dominican Republic got the last spot.

Four countries qualified for the 2015 Pan American Games on Tuesday from standings based on the combined all-events of the top two bowlers from each non-qualified country.

The United States easily led the way, while Aruba, Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic also qualified bringing the total number of qualified countries to 12.

Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Mexico and Venezuela secured spots previous to this week's event. The final two spots will be awarded at the Central and Caribbean Games later this year.

All rounds of the PABCON Women's Championships are being broadcast live on BOWL.com's BowlTV.

2014 PABCON WOMEN'S CHAMPIONSHIPS
At Cali Bowling Coliseum, Cali, Colombia
Tuesday's results

TEAM
(Six games)

GOLD - United States (Shannon Pluhowsky 664, Shannon O'Keefe 1261, Danielle McEwan 645, Liz Johnson 1,375, Kelly Kulick 1,341, Missy Parkin, 1,452), 6,738
SILVER - Canada (Valerie Calberry 1,286, Lynne Gauthier 1,242, Miranda Panas 1,324, Samantha Wong How 1,178, Isabelle Rioux 1,271), 6,301
BRONZE - Mexico (Ashanti Sanchez 1,250, Lilia Robles 1,261, Iliana Lomeli 653, Sayuri Yamada 524, Aseret Zetter 1,232, Sandra Gongora 1,275), 6,195

ALL-EVENTS
(24 games)

GOLD - Missy Parkin, United States, 5,515
SILVER - Kelly Kulick, United States, 5,426
BRONZE - Liz Johnson, United States, 5,354

Team Results
All-Events Results