The Women’s bowling team began their first season ever during late October with only six team members. The bowlers competed in their fifth tournament of the season this past weekend at the Warhawk Open in Addison, IL, ranking 24^th out of 24 teams. Despite the loss, several members had personal bests at the tournament. Freshman, Taylor Kies, placed in 40^th out of 198 competitors. Freshman, Alex Buffington, and Sophomore, Kasia Mucha, were not far behind placing in 45^th and 48^th respectively.
The team has only had five competitions in total, all of which landed them in low ranks amongst other teams. Even with the losses in previous competitions, “A positive attitude is a key to making the season fun and successful,” Mucha said.
“From the previous tournaments, we’ve had to keep our spirits up and push through to the end which is something I, and probably the rest of the team have found to be the key to our success. Bowling for 6 hours straight is exhausting and to get up and do it again the next morning isn’t always easy so as long as we are keeping a positive attitude, I’ve noticed we tend to do pretty well,” Mucha said.
Being a new team on campus, without previous experiences to follow has its challenges, but benefits as well. First-year bowler, Ariel Gonsowski-Padron, also has a positive outlook about being a new team on campus and hopes for future improvements.
“The most exciting thing about being the first bowling team on campus is that we can set our own records. We all love to joke around whenever we say, ‘We just bowled the highest series in Augustana history’ after we have bowled high. It’s pretty cool being a new team because no one has any expectations for us. We don’t have any weight on our shoulders when we walk into a tournament,” Padron said.
The team has a large gap between their next tournament which is the Eagle Baker Challenge on January 13.  Padron and Mucha stated their hopes for the rest of the season.
“My goal is mainly just to improve my average. Another important goal I have for myself is to become a better teammate. If others see how close of a team we are, they’ll be more interested in joining us,” Padron said.
Mucha agreed with Padron.
“Looking forward I’m hoping we just keep beating our records and making more headlines, we have to show people we are the real deal now don’t we? Being a new team is nice because we are setting the foundation for future seasons and personally I believe we are setting a solid one and having fun doing it,” Mucha said.