Women's bowling took second place while the men finished fifth at the Mid-South Conference (MSC) Lynne Jordan Memorial Tournament January 20 in Louisville, Kentucky.

The one-day event included five team games, followed by 12 baker games and the Lady Lions had a decent start, posting a game one score of 939. The scoring pace just

went higher from there. Lindenwood followed with 1072, one of the highest games of the last few years with all five players in the line-up shooting above 200. Games of 1011, 942, and 1036 followed for a total of 5000 on the dot. That was good enough for third place heading into baker, just 63 pins behind second place Pikeville and 97 pins behind Webber International in first.

The Lady Lions continued their charge in the opening set with a four-game total of 829. After starting set two with 194, they put together the best baker game in several years, shooting 288 which included a stretch of 10 strikes in a row. After posting 850 for that set, Lindenwood ended up on the same pair as Pikeville, the team that had taken over the lead. In the de facto position round, the Lady Lions pulled as close as 46 pins, but weren't able to overtake the Bears for the tournament title. Lindenwood finished with a baker total of 2485 (207.08 average) and a grand total of 7485 for second place, 103 pins behind Pikeville and 72 pins ahead of third place Webber International.

In the men's event, the Lions started slowly and found themselves over 200 pins behind the leaders after game one, but the next game was significantly better. An 1162 launched Lindenwood up to sixth place. The Lions continued to surge with 1083 in game three which moved them into third place, but they weren't able to keep that pace.

Finishing team competition with games of 1001 and 1018, Lindenwood fell back to fifth place with a total of 5164 and sat 159 pins out of third and 84 pins out of fourth.
The Lions regained some momentum during the 12 games of baker, beginning with an opening set of 808 that included a 238 game. Set two was the best of the day for Lindenwood. With high games of 256 and 245, the Lions posted 921 in set two, and finished with 830 in the final set for a baker total of 2559 (213.25 average), but the scoring pace was still high, preventing Lindenwood from making up any ground. With a grand total of 7723, the Lions finished in fifth, 69 pins ahead of St. Francis (Ill.) University in sixth, but almost 200 pins behind McKendree University in fourth.

Individually, the Lady Lions had four players finish in the top 20, led by Hailey Bozych with a five-game total of 1050 (210 average) in eighth place. Liz Rittenour was right behind her in ninth place with 1040 (208 average), Samantha Smith finished in 16^th place with 1018 (203.6 average), and Haylie Frick took 18^th with 1010 (202 average).

Javier Muniz Vega led the Lions individually with 1108 (221.6 average) to take ninth place. Making his season debut, Drew Mirly was right behind in 10^th place with 1102 (220.4 average), including a high game of 267. Nathan Bassford finished 13^th with 1096 (219.2 average) including a high game of 266, and Blake Reiger took 18^th with a total of 1077 (215.4 average).

After a weekend off, men's and women's bowling travels across the river for the Baker Challenge February 3-4 in Fairview Heights, Illinois.