Scotch Plains Beats Summit in Bowling, Stays Undefeated

After the excitement of Mike Tufaro's perfect game on Monday, it was back to business for the Scotch Plains-Fanwood bowling team on Wednesday night as they remained unbeaten with a 7-0 win over Summit, pushing the Raiders to 5-0 for the season.

Tufaro once again led the way with a match high series of 653, capped off by a 255 in the middle game. It may not have been their best effort of the year, but SP-F still cruised by 603 pins.

"We bowled all right," Tufaro said. "It's hard to bowl when teams are less competitive, but we stuck with it, won every game, and also, Katerina (Noir), our third bowler wasn't here, so we had to replace her."

"We didn't bowl as well as we would have liked to, but after the other day, I thought we'd have a slight let down," added SP-F coach James Mason. "Katerina was out today, but a good team does what they have to do, we did that today, so I'm happy with that."

Greg Budis had a solid day, rolling a 204 in the opener on his way to a 562 series for his three games. That was the second best series behind Tufaro, and more than enough to get the job done.

"I bowled all right," Budis said. "I didn't get that many strikes but I made a lot of spares, which is a big difference in the way I shot yesterday. This year, we want to win the states, maybe even counties, something to put on the school board. We're very confident this year. We can put our minds to anything and do it."

"Greg was throwing the ball a lot better today," Mason added. "He was making his spares, and like I said before, that's what I like about this team, everyday it seems like somebody else steps up and helps us out when we need it."

The team was disappointed to find out that because of a change in the schedule, the much-anticipated matchup against No. 1 Roselle Catholic, scheduled for the final day of the regular season, was cancelled. The hope is that the Raiders will get a shot at the Lions in the county tournament.

"We've been looking forward to bowling them since the start," Tufaro said. "We feel like it's us and them and that would have been a nice match. We plan on seeing them at the end of the counties."

As for Tufaro's recent 300-game, it vaulted him into celebrity status at school, with friends and teachers congratulating him on the rare feat.

"I had a lot of people come up to me and congratulate me, all my teachers and the athletic director from my school (Rob Harmer). It takes a lot of pressure off. The more I think about it, the more I realize what I did, it's kind of hard to believe," he said.

"As a junior, he (Tufaro) showed a lot of poise, and he's the guy we count on, a guy the rest of the kids count on to set the tone, and he's doing that very nicely. We're very pleased with him," continued Coach Mason.

Also contributing to the team's win over Summit were Peter Citera, who rolled a 199 in the first game, Nick Stawicki (197 in the first game) and Chris Buldo, who did a solid job filling in for Noir.

Next up, the Raiders will take on Jonathan Dayton next Monday at 4 p.m. at Jersey Lanes in Linden, looking to keep their unbeaten streak intact before the Christmas break.