BATON ROUGE – For the Dutchtown girls’ team, there is a bit of history they are looking to accomplish when the Louisiana High School Athletics Association bowling playoffs resume on Wednesday at Premier Lanes in Gonzales.

If the Griffins can get through two matches that day, they will be in the rarified air of three consecutive state championships. They will be only the second girls’ team to win at least three straight, dating back to the opening four years (2005-08) when Denham Springs won four consecutive.

Lafayette is the only other school that has three championships on the girls’ side, winning in 2009, 2010 and 2012.

Dutchtown’s ride through the 2025 season, has been fun and fulfilling.

“This season has been amazing,” said Dutchtown Coach Karen Beam said of the undefeated Griffins.  “All of the girls returned from last season and were determined to make it to the state finals again.  They are a team.  When we step onto the approach, no one is worried about her individual point.  They are focused on the team points.  We began practices in September and all the bowlers have been committed to the practice routine and practice frequently on their own.  A great part of our success is due to the bowlers that are in the 1-3 spots in the roster.  Jewel Boatner, Aubrey Saez and Lily Spohn have raised their averages by at least 30 pins from last season.”

For St. Scholastica Academy, a win in the championship round would make it the next girls’ team to win three titles in the division overall with previous wins in 2015 and 2016.

The action gets underway at 1 p.m. on Wednesday as No. 1 seed Dutchtown takes on its East Ascension Parish rivals from St. Amant. The No. 13 seed Gators knocked off the No. 4 seed from South Terrebonne (21-6) and then No. 5 Denham Springs, 18-9. The other semifinal will have No. 3 SSA meeting the 2021 champs from Archbishop Chapelle.

And as Coach Beam rightly pointed out, it will again be interesting to see if the trend of recent years of the 1-2-3 bowlers in the low to high average lineup will be as important as in has become in recent years in championship winning teams. There has been more of an even payoff in a lot of matches with the top averages but the lower average bowlers having some of their best games of the year have determined many matches in the playoffs.

Dutchtown can go 156-160-176 in their low three and the only other team in the semifinals that can compete with that is Chapelle with 166-167-176.

But while Dutchtown (six-player total of 1,062) and Chapelle (1,087) are the favorite in the semifinals, St. Amant won both its matches with solid, steady game totals that countered the ups and downs of their opponents. That’s why over the course of 18-games bowled (3 by each on the roster) a lot can happen.

For Dutchtown and St. Amant in their semifinal matchup, they will both be familiar with Premier which is their home venues and should have some knowledge of the six-lane VIP bay which will host the championship match because it has always had different characteristics from the main set of lanes.

On the boys’ side, it was sort of so-so playoff year for the Baton Rouge schools, but the story of University High in Division II is one that will be talked about concerning how to find the right blend of people and a coach that knows success in one sport and is finding it in another.

Under Coach Aaron Vice, who also is the offensive coordinator for a very good U-High football program, a good mix of veterans and youth, guys that play other sports, athletes who have earned scholarships to prestigious military academies have all blended together to be the only Baton Rouge team still bowling on the final week of the season.

Coach Vice told me there was a point when he began to feel like his team was going to jell into a team that could be a contender. “(It was) after we defeated Madison Prep (in the regular season meeting),” Vice said. “Some of my newer bowlers had great matches that helped us over the hump at that point. That win kind of got the momentum going.”

In the playoffs, U-High defeated No. 3 seed 17.5-9.5 to get to the semifinals as the six seed where they will face No. 10 seed Belle Chasse, which took out No. 7 seed Vandebilt Catholic (22-5) and No. 2 seed St. Thomas More by the same score.

On paper, Belle Chasse can put out a lineup of 1,100 average, while U-High comes in at 945. It will again be the 1-2-3 bowlers for the Cubs that will need to bowl their best to make up the average differences.

The favorite in both divisions come from New Orleans as Archbishop Shaw is a prohibitive favorite in Division II (4A & below) and seven-time champion Brother Martin is the top seed in Division I (5A).

The boys’ semifinals on Thursday will begin at 9:30 a.m. at Premier Gonzales in Division II with Division I semis at 11:45 a.m. The championships will be conducted at 1:30 and 3:45 p.m.

I am looking forward to rejoining this year Ken Trahan and Lenny Vangilder for the streaming coverage of the championship matches on Crescent City Sports. We’ll also have coverage of the stepladder singles finals on Friday.

And of course, we’ll have written coverage each evening of the finals here on WBRZ.com. Until then, good luck and good bowling.