June 9, 2025 • 10 mins
Professional Women's Bowling Tour Stops by Lincoln This Week
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
That's an important day if you are a fan of
bowling or of sport, and this is a really cool
thing that is happening right here in Nebraska, just down
the road in Lincoln at Sun Valley Lanes, the twenty
twenty five US Women's Open with the Professional Women's Bowling Association.
We are blessed to be joined by one of the
competitors from England, Verity Crawley, is joining us on the
(00:21):
phone line today. Verity, thank you so much for.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
Calling in today, hid thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
Okay, so bowling the US Women's Open Nebraska. People are
probably very confused how Nebraska kind of fits into this,
but I promise there's actually a really cool connection to
bowling and Nebraska if you're not paying attention. But first
I want to talk about you, Verity. You're from England.
People can hear that in your accent. How did you
get started in bowling with all th family?
Speaker 2 (00:47):
My mum used to bowl and she got myself and
my brother involved at a very young age. So I've
been bowling since I was five. I grew up bowling
in the UK, and then when I was eighteen, I
actually moved to the US to ball collegiately. So in
the UK, we don't have high school bowling, we don't
have collegiate bawling, and that is huge in America. So
(01:07):
for me, it was kind of the stepping stone the
next level I wanted to learn and developed by moved
to Florida to study at university and that kind of
links into being because Nebraska has a very huge women's
bowling program, So it's very exciting to come to somewhere
that has for me a lot of history with bowling.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
Yeah, and you led me right into the next day, right,
like Nebraska's relationship with bowling. Women's bowling in Nebraska is
really really big national championship contenders on a year and
a year out basis. Can you tell our listeners who
might not be aware of this, you know, kind of
mergeoning sport, like how popular it is, especially in the
(01:47):
women's level, and how many you know schools when you
were bowling collegiately that you would see and all the
different you know women from around the country that'll be
bowling exactly.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
There's so many schools and they're just constantly growing and
the players keep getting better better, both on the men's
and the women's side. But on the women's side, Ncuba
teams are flourishing. The Brasca is one of those, and
I think that it's amazing to see the schools give
so much support to the sport, and these Ntuba schools
they put so much funding towards the bowling programs because
(02:18):
they appreciate that it is a sport. And I just
hope that the general public can start to see that
we do have a professional side of it. And you know,
it starts at the collegiate and then once you graduate,
you have this opportunity to bowl on the FEEDBA Tour
and compete against the best in the world. I mean,
we have bowlers coming from Asia, from Europe, from all
(02:38):
over to compete throughout the summer. And this is one
of our stops is in Lincoln, the US Open.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
Yeah, the US Open coming to Sun Valley Lanes and
Lincoln for the Professional Women's Bowling Association, one of the
true major tournaments in all of the entire sport. Were
joined by Verity Crawley on our phone line today. So Verity,
I have to add about the importance of the professional game.
I think a lot of people have noticed professional basketball
(03:06):
with Caitlin Clark and the kind of attention she's brought
to professional women's basketball. Women haven't always had the type
of professional leagues that men have had, and bowling is
one of those that, you know, it's an underneath the
radar sport on both the men's and women's side. But
now there's a television deal, people can actually watch this
on the CBS Sports Network. What's going on with the
(03:28):
US Women's Open. How can you best describe the growth
of this particular league in the professionalism and how many
women are generally going to all of these different events
throughout the year.
Speaker 2 (03:38):
Yeah, So this year is actually the tenth anniversary of
the Women's Tour. Unfortunately, you know, eleven years ago, the
Women's Tour didn't even exist. It folded for ten plus
years to whether it wasn't this huge platform for women
to compete on. So it's pretty special knowing that this
is the tenth anniversary of the tour relaunching and giving
(03:58):
US females an opportunity to compete against other females prior
to ten years ago, the likes of Kelly Kulick and
some other huge names on the PBA Tour. We're competing
against the men. So for me, that shows how much
it has grown, and year after year we're getting more
and more players, some internationally, some that have graduated college,
that are competing week in and week out. The US
(04:21):
Women's Open, it is one of the most prestigious events
we have. It's a major, and it's actually a limited
field because of that, whereas some of our other events
have anywhere from ninety to two hundred bowlers depending on
the event. We just bowled USBC Queens in Las Vegas,
which is also a major, that was also televised on
CBS Sports Network, and I think we had around one
(04:42):
hundred and fifty to one hundred and ninety people compete
at that one. Wow.
Speaker 1 (04:46):
Okay, so there you go. It is very popular sport
bowling and I know a lot of people. You know,
we go to the bowling center and we are able
just to bowl for fun. A lot of people are
in regular leagues. Can you talk about the quality of
the not just the actual competition, but how difficult it
is because it's not the same Like if you go
to bowling league and you start throwing a bowling ball,
(05:08):
you I am getting the hang of this, I'm doing
pretty well, but the oil pattern and then the equipment
that you guys are using is way different than what
people are just you know, grabbing and using potentially for
a night out at the bowling alley. So can you
how do you can you describe for me just the
difference in how difficult it actually is to bowl on
the oil patterns that you guys are seeing for these
big professional events.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Absolutely, bowling gets way more technical when you get to
our level. So obviously I have eighteen bowling balls with
me for the US Open this week, so that in
itself it can become complicated.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
Right.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
We have different bowling balls that are created to do
different things on the lanes, and that goes along with
the oil patterns that we bowl on. So at the
US Open this week, we have four different oil patterns
and there's not going to be anything close to what
you regular league. In your regular league, you have miss rooms.
So if you miss to the right or you miss
to the left on the lane, going to have some friction,
(06:01):
you're going to have some oil. So generally it's still
very possible to get to the pocket. Whereas for us
competing at the highest level, we don't have that same
margin for error. We have to be I will say,
more perfect, and we have to make better shots, and
then you're bawling against people who essentially they feel like
we're machines, right, we just repeat shot after and over
(06:22):
and over and over again. So the caliber of player
is so high, and there is just so much technical
that goes into it. I think a lot of people
don't realize.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
They definitely do not. I actually did bawl in college
as well, so I have a little bit of insight
to kind of how it works. And my world was
rocked a bit even in college of just how different
the competitiveness and also how different the lanes were behaving
versus what I had been used to when I was
bawling as a kid in high school. Verdy Crawley is
(06:54):
going to be competing in the US Women's Open for
Bowling happening in Lincoln at Sun Valley Lanes coming up
starting tomorrow and going through the weekend, Verity, can you
can kind of explain what the format is? So I
see a four week's worth of events here, what does
that look like? And how do you get down to
the nitty gritty and win this thing?
Speaker 2 (07:14):
Bowl a lot of games essentially, So the event starts
tomorrow but we have a practice session all day on Wednesday,
and then the true event really starts on Thursday with qualifying.
We have three different days of qualifying and we bowlt
eight games for each qualifying block. From there, the field
is cut to the top one in three so depending
(07:34):
on how many entries there are, there is a cut.
You then bowl again. You have another practice session, you
bowl another eight games, and then they cut to the
top twenty four players. And once they have cut to
the top twenty four players, we bowl eight games of
match play one day and then the next day we
boil sixteen games of match play. So in order to
(07:55):
make it to those TV finals next Tuesday at six
pm on CBS Sports Network, it's a lot of games.
I made the TV show last year and I think
I bought sixty four games to make it to that point.
So you have all of your qualifying games to make
the cut, and then we have match play as well.
So if anyone's interested in coming out and watching, we
will be at sun Valley Lanes literally all weeks, day
(08:17):
in and day out, from morning till night. There is
a lot of bowling that's going to be going on.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
And you're going to see it at the highest level
as the twenty twenty five US Women's Open, with the
festivities beginning tomorrow, but the real competition is Verity mentioned
coming up on Thursday, ending all the way next Tuesday,
a really long and arduous process. Last thing for you, Verity,
I know that you also are on social media. Can
people kind of follow along with what you got going
(08:44):
on even when you leave Lincoln after next week?
Speaker 2 (08:46):
Yes? Absolutely, I'm very active on my social media, both
mainly Instagram and Facebook. I post updates week in and
week out of how the bowling is going and a
little bit of life, how life is on tour. You
know a lot of people again don't know the profession
side of the sport, so I want to try and
share that with people. So you can just search my
name Veritie Crawley and find me on all the social
(09:07):
media platforms.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
That's so cool, Verity Crawley. She is on the PWBA
tour the US Women's Open happening in Lincoln at sun
Valley Lanes starting tomorrow and you can check that out.
They have a bunch of information online as well. Verity,
thank you so much for being on our show today.
Good luck at the Women's open here in Lincoln. We
thank you so much for being on our show.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
Thank you so much, Emory. I hope that you and
all of your listeners come out and watch us. Oh.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Absolutely going to be keeping an eye on what's going
on in Lincoln. The United States Open for women's bowling
happening right over down the road in Lincoln. Pretty cool stuff.
Three sixteen, We are about twenty minutes away from talking
College World Series with my friend Amy Hornocker. That's going
to be coming up as well. Stick with us on
news radio eleven ten KFAB.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
Emory Sunger on news radio eleven ten KFAB
That's an important day if you are a fan of
bowling or of sport, and this is a really cool
thing that is happening right here in Nebraska, just down
the road in Lincoln at Sun Valley Lanes, the twenty
twenty five US Women's Open with the Professional Women's Bowling Association.
We are blessed to be joined by one of the
competitors from England, Verity Crawley, is joining us on the
(00:21):
phone line today. Verity, thank you so much for.
Speaker 2 (00:23):
Calling in today, hid thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
Okay, so bowling the US Women's Open Nebraska. People are
probably very confused how Nebraska kind of fits into this,
but I promise there's actually a really cool connection to
bowling and Nebraska if you're not paying attention. But first
I want to talk about you, Verity. You're from England.
People can hear that in your accent. How did you
get started in bowling with all th family?
Speaker 2 (00:47):
My mum used to bowl and she got myself and
my brother involved at a very young age. So I've
been bowling since I was five. I grew up bowling
in the UK, and then when I was eighteen, I
actually moved to the US to ball collegiately. So in
the UK, we don't have high school bowling, we don't
have collegiate bawling, and that is huge in America. So
(01:07):
for me, it was kind of the stepping stone the
next level I wanted to learn and developed by moved
to Florida to study at university and that kind of
links into being because Nebraska has a very huge women's
bowling program, So it's very exciting to come to somewhere
that has for me a lot of history with bowling.
Speaker 1 (01:27):
Yeah, and you led me right into the next day, right,
like Nebraska's relationship with bowling. Women's bowling in Nebraska is
really really big national championship contenders on a year and
a year out basis. Can you tell our listeners who
might not be aware of this, you know, kind of
mergeoning sport, like how popular it is, especially in the
(01:47):
women's level, and how many you know schools when you
were bowling collegiately that you would see and all the
different you know women from around the country that'll be
bowling exactly.
Speaker 2 (01:56):
There's so many schools and they're just constantly growing and
the players keep getting better better, both on the men's
and the women's side. But on the women's side, Ncuba
teams are flourishing. The Brasca is one of those, and
I think that it's amazing to see the schools give
so much support to the sport, and these Ntuba schools
they put so much funding towards the bowling programs because
(02:18):
they appreciate that it is a sport. And I just
hope that the general public can start to see that
we do have a professional side of it. And you know,
it starts at the collegiate and then once you graduate,
you have this opportunity to bowl on the FEEDBA Tour
and compete against the best in the world. I mean,
we have bowlers coming from Asia, from Europe, from all
(02:38):
over to compete throughout the summer. And this is one
of our stops is in Lincoln, the US Open.
Speaker 1 (02:45):
Yeah, the US Open coming to Sun Valley Lanes and
Lincoln for the Professional Women's Bowling Association, one of the
true major tournaments in all of the entire sport. Were
joined by Verity Crawley on our phone line today. So Verity,
I have to add about the importance of the professional game.
I think a lot of people have noticed professional basketball
(03:06):
with Caitlin Clark and the kind of attention she's brought
to professional women's basketball. Women haven't always had the type
of professional leagues that men have had, and bowling is
one of those that, you know, it's an underneath the
radar sport on both the men's and women's side. But
now there's a television deal, people can actually watch this
on the CBS Sports Network. What's going on with the
(03:28):
US Women's Open. How can you best describe the growth
of this particular league in the professionalism and how many
women are generally going to all of these different events
throughout the year.
Speaker 2 (03:38):
Yeah, So this year is actually the tenth anniversary of
the Women's Tour. Unfortunately, you know, eleven years ago, the
Women's Tour didn't even exist. It folded for ten plus
years to whether it wasn't this huge platform for women
to compete on. So it's pretty special knowing that this
is the tenth anniversary of the tour relaunching and giving
(03:58):
US females an opportunity to compete against other females prior
to ten years ago, the likes of Kelly Kulick and
some other huge names on the PBA Tour. We're competing
against the men. So for me, that shows how much
it has grown, and year after year we're getting more
and more players, some internationally, some that have graduated college,
that are competing week in and week out. The US
(04:21):
Women's Open, it is one of the most prestigious events
we have. It's a major, and it's actually a limited
field because of that, whereas some of our other events
have anywhere from ninety to two hundred bowlers depending on
the event. We just bowled USBC Queens in Las Vegas,
which is also a major, that was also televised on
CBS Sports Network, and I think we had around one
(04:42):
hundred and fifty to one hundred and ninety people compete
at that one. Wow.
Speaker 1 (04:46):
Okay, so there you go. It is very popular sport
bowling and I know a lot of people. You know,
we go to the bowling center and we are able
just to bowl for fun. A lot of people are
in regular leagues. Can you talk about the quality of
the not just the actual competition, but how difficult it
is because it's not the same Like if you go
to bowling league and you start throwing a bowling ball,
(05:08):
you I am getting the hang of this, I'm doing
pretty well, but the oil pattern and then the equipment
that you guys are using is way different than what
people are just you know, grabbing and using potentially for
a night out at the bowling alley. So can you
how do you can you describe for me just the
difference in how difficult it actually is to bowl on
the oil patterns that you guys are seeing for these
big professional events.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Absolutely, bowling gets way more technical when you get to
our level. So obviously I have eighteen bowling balls with
me for the US Open this week, so that in
itself it can become complicated.
Speaker 1 (05:40):
Right.
Speaker 2 (05:40):
We have different bowling balls that are created to do
different things on the lanes, and that goes along with
the oil patterns that we bowl on. So at the
US Open this week, we have four different oil patterns
and there's not going to be anything close to what
you regular league. In your regular league, you have miss rooms.
So if you miss to the right or you miss
to the left on the lane, going to have some friction,
(06:01):
you're going to have some oil. So generally it's still
very possible to get to the pocket. Whereas for us
competing at the highest level, we don't have that same
margin for error. We have to be I will say,
more perfect, and we have to make better shots, and
then you're bawling against people who essentially they feel like
we're machines, right, we just repeat shot after and over
(06:22):
and over and over again. So the caliber of player
is so high, and there is just so much technical
that goes into it. I think a lot of people
don't realize.
Speaker 1 (06:32):
They definitely do not. I actually did bawl in college
as well, so I have a little bit of insight
to kind of how it works. And my world was
rocked a bit even in college of just how different
the competitiveness and also how different the lanes were behaving
versus what I had been used to when I was
bawling as a kid in high school. Verdy Crawley is
(06:54):
going to be competing in the US Women's Open for
Bowling happening in Lincoln at Sun Valley Lanes coming up
starting tomorrow and going through the weekend, Verity, can you
can kind of explain what the format is? So I
see a four week's worth of events here, what does
that look like? And how do you get down to
the nitty gritty and win this thing?
Speaker 2 (07:14):
Bowl a lot of games essentially, So the event starts
tomorrow but we have a practice session all day on Wednesday,
and then the true event really starts on Thursday with qualifying.
We have three different days of qualifying and we bowlt
eight games for each qualifying block. From there, the field
is cut to the top one in three so depending
(07:34):
on how many entries there are, there is a cut.
You then bowl again. You have another practice session, you
bowl another eight games, and then they cut to the
top twenty four players. And once they have cut to
the top twenty four players, we bowl eight games of
match play one day and then the next day we
boil sixteen games of match play. So in order to
(07:55):
make it to those TV finals next Tuesday at six
pm on CBS Sports Network, it's a lot of games.
I made the TV show last year and I think
I bought sixty four games to make it to that point.
So you have all of your qualifying games to make
the cut, and then we have match play as well.
So if anyone's interested in coming out and watching, we
will be at sun Valley Lanes literally all weeks, day
(08:17):
in and day out, from morning till night. There is
a lot of bowling that's going to be going on.
Speaker 1 (08:22):
And you're going to see it at the highest level
as the twenty twenty five US Women's Open, with the
festivities beginning tomorrow, but the real competition is Verity mentioned
coming up on Thursday, ending all the way next Tuesday,
a really long and arduous process. Last thing for you, Verity,
I know that you also are on social media. Can
people kind of follow along with what you got going
(08:44):
on even when you leave Lincoln after next week?
Speaker 2 (08:46):
Yes? Absolutely, I'm very active on my social media, both
mainly Instagram and Facebook. I post updates week in and
week out of how the bowling is going and a
little bit of life, how life is on tour. You
know a lot of people again don't know the profession
side of the sport, so I want to try and
share that with people. So you can just search my
name Veritie Crawley and find me on all the social
(09:07):
media platforms.
Speaker 1 (09:08):
That's so cool, Verity Crawley. She is on the PWBA
tour the US Women's Open happening in Lincoln at sun
Valley Lanes starting tomorrow and you can check that out.
They have a bunch of information online as well. Verity,
thank you so much for being on our show today.
Good luck at the Women's open here in Lincoln. We
thank you so much for being on our show.
Speaker 2 (09:29):
Thank you so much, Emory. I hope that you and
all of your listeners come out and watch us. Oh.
Speaker 1 (09:33):
Absolutely going to be keeping an eye on what's going
on in Lincoln. The United States Open for women's bowling
happening right over down the road in Lincoln. Pretty cool stuff.
Three sixteen, We are about twenty minutes away from talking
College World Series with my friend Amy Hornocker. That's going
to be coming up as well. Stick with us on
news radio eleven ten KFAB.
Speaker 2 (09:53):
Emory Sunger on news radio eleven ten KFAB
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