Dom Strauss, St. Charles East, Senior, Boys Bowling
What he did: Earned a team-best pinfall of 2,714 in 12 games, helping East take third at the IHSA state meet in O'Fallon this past weekend
St. Charles East senior Dom Strauss says he wasn't initially pondering a potential collegiate bowling career. After a strong outing for the Saints at the state tournament over the weekend, he since has received a number of overtures. Strauss, the Kane County Chronicle-St. Charles Bank & Trust Athlete of the Week, caught up with Chronicle sports reporter Kevin Druley about his recent run. Here's an edited transcript of the conversation:
What do you take away from what the team did?
We definitely had a great season. Our goal all year really was just to get to state. And then when we got to state, it was like, you know, let's keep going. … We took home a trophy, and really exceeded all of our goals this year.
At which point was it feasible to re-evaluate those state goals?
Once we moved on to Day 2, we started off pretty strong. And our coaches tried to not to let us find out where we were placed so it doesn't get to our head, but eventually we figured out how we were doing. And we decided to step up our game in the afternoon of the second day.
Any last thoughts on the Saints' depth?
Oh, it was phenomenal. It's awesome that if one of our strongest bowlers is not doing that great, we can reach into our pool of other phenomenal bowlers and they'll go out and do exactly what we need them to do.
Is concession food better at state?
We did not want to eat the concession food this weekend, actually. We got Jimmy John's both days at lunch. Then Friday we went to an Italian restaurant for dinner, and Saturday we went to Texas Roadhouse, so we were pretty well-fed.