Falcon Bowling Perfection Part 2

Chris Sandham kept a promise he made to his bowling coach four years ago.

When he and his friend and fellow bowler Matt Servedio were freshmen at , they promised coach Marianne DiRupo they would both bowl perfect games in their senior year. . Not to be outdone, Sandham reached perfection on Dec. 15 in a match against High Point.

Sandham, who has been bowling for eight years, said he didn’t really start thinking about the game being perfect until the ninth frame. Before that, he said he’d crossed over in both the fifth and sixth frame.

“I was a little bit nervous about my fifth and sixth frame shots, because I crossed over. But they were both pretty explosive shots, so I thought everything might go down,” Sandham said. “And it was still too early in the match to think about a perfect game anyway.”

After those two shots, Sandham said that DiRupo took him away from the rest of the team and just stayed with him, making sure he stayed calm and went through his routine.

“Every shot I have a routine where I pick up my ball, roll it on my shirt, put my hand over the air fan, brush my hand off on my shirt and then shoot,” Sandham said. “I just kept doing the same thing.”

DiRupo wanted to be sure Sandham was breathing properly, and staying calm

“I just checked to make sure he was going through his routine and breathing so his heart rate would stay low,” DiRupo said.

By the final frame, when it became very possible that Sandham would reach perfection, he said he was thinking of his father.

“My dad wasn’t there that day because he was having minor surgery,” Sandham said. “I was just thinking of him, knowing I had to do it for him. Before I left for school that morning, my dad told me to get a 300 for him. I was pretty disappointed that he couldn’t be there to watch me do it.”

When the final shot left his hands, Sandham said he felt pretty confident.

“I just said that this has to be a strike,” Sandham said. “There’s no way I’m not going to get this.”

DiRupo said she was so excited for Sandham that she even shed a tear.

“I knew what Chris was going through that day, being concerned about his father, who is his biggest fan,” she said. “I was just so happy for him.”