Thirty-one Kansas schools competed this season in the newest official sport for the Kansas State High School Activities Association: Unified Bowling.
KSHSAA partnered up with Special Olympics Kansas to elevate Unified Bowling to a championship-level sport. This new program aims to create more opportunities for inclusion and leadership activities for students across the state.
Taylor Obersteadt, Unified Champion Schools Manager at Special Olympics Kansas, said the process of approaching KSHSAA to elevate Unified Bowling began two years ago. Obersteadt saw tremendous progress by her organization in other states around the country.
Obersteadt said her organization has had a pretty good history across the country starting partnerships with state activities associations to create inclusive interscholastic programs, but she felt like that was not reflected as well back home in Kansas.
"We were just kind of behind," Obersteadt said. "So when I started to hear about (state-championship level Unified Sports) across the nation, I really wanted to bring it to Kansas."
Obersteadt started with investigating what the really successful programs looked like and which one would work best for a partnership between Special Olympics Kansas and KSHSAA. She identified Nebraska's Unified Bowling program as being a great blueprint. She thought bowling also lends itself well for statewide competition.
"It's kind of the easiest sport to make sure that the kiddos can have a similar skill level and it would be a competitive model as a high school sport," shed said.
The teams compete in a Baker game format where frames alternate between five student-athletes, two with intellectual disabilities and three students without intellectual disabilities. The competitions consist of six games to decide the winning team.
With the plan in hand, Obersteadt went to somebody she knew could help navigate the process of sanctioning a championship-level sport. Obersteadt, who spent time as a paraprofessional at her alma mater Shawnee Mission South before taking a job with Special Olympics Kansas, reached out Raiders athletic director Josh Johnson.
"I knew he would be a great ally and he really was just that," Obersteadt said of Johnson, who has been a proponent of SM South's Unified Sports programs throughout his two decades as the school's athletic director.
Even before fielding a Unified Bowling team this year, SM South offered basketball, soccer and bocce ball as Unified Sports. The school received national recognition when it was placed on the Special Olympics' ESPN 2021 Honor Roll, an honor given to 25 schools across the country.
Obersteadt described Johnson as championing the cause for them and knocking on the right doors to deliver their proposals for Unified Bowling. When she approached Johnson about making it KSHSAA sanctioned sport, he told her "Let me take it from here."
"There's a lot of steps to take to get to where it is now," Johnson said.
Johnson presented those plans first to the Kansas Coaches Association, where it received a majority vote. He also laid the groundwork by letting the KSHSAA executive board know in Nov. 2019 that he was working on getting this in motion.
"I had eight or 10 (athletic directors) at that moment come up to me and say 'Hey, if you need any help, let us know,'" Johnson said.
The process slowed down a little when the pandemic forced Johnson to conduct his presentations for Unified Bowling on Zoom meetings instead of in person, but the plans never hit any major roadblock or detractors.
"We needed quite a few people to say yes to this … and everybody, down to a person, said yes," he said. "When everybody says yes, that's a powerful force."
The supporters saw the potential for Unified Bowling to help with efforts to normalize disabilities and create a more inclusive environment for students at their schools and in their communities. Obersteadt said many high schools do a good job of providing inclusion, but sometimes they miss out on providing "meaningful inclusion."
"An analogy we like to use a lot at Special Olympics Kansas is there's a difference between inviting someone to a dance and inviting someone to dance," Obersteadt said.
Obersteadt remembers competing in high school sports at Shawnee Mission South and having a student with intellectual disabilities as a team manager. She said he was included, but he did get the same bonding experiences as student-athletes on the team.
"I think Unified Bowling provides that opportunity where students with and without disabilities have a chance to be on a team together and really learn those key things you do get from sports," she said.
Obersteadt sees Unified Sports as a huge opportunity for students without disabilities as well. Many of the partner bowlers will not be varsity bowlers when the winter bowling season starts.
"It's still a competitive model, but we're really looking for kiddos who kind of have similar playing levels," she said. "It just really opens the door for kids of all abilities."
Those student-athletes got the first taste of competition with a six-week season this fall before three regional tournaments decided the 15-team field at the 2021 KSHSAA Unified Bowling State Championship Thursday, Nov. 18 at Mission Bowl in Olathe.
Shawnee Mission South, which will host the state event, barely squeezed into the final five of its regional. The Raiders took the fifth spot behind Shawnee Mission East, Lansing, Bonner Springs and Lawrence at the Shawnee Mission Northwest region.
Johnson said the final moments seeing the team jostle for the last state qualifier spot exemplified the impact of Unified Sports competing at a championship level.
"When you go to a Unified Bowling competition, you can't help but smile because the spirit of competition is as pure as it gets," Johnson said. "Shawnee Mission South was fighting for that fifth spot to advance to state. Everybody started feeling that competitive part of this. The anxiety, the competitive anxiety about are we going to make it or not."
As the host team, he said the relief was palpable when the Raiders clinched the fifth spot.
"There were tears all around, from the parents, the athletes and the coaches, and from me," Johnson said.
Shawnee Mission East took first place at that regional, finishing with 736 points thanks to impressive scores in the final two games. The Lancers trailed Lansing by 13 pins before scoring 144 and 133 points to close out the victory. Lansing took runner-up with 720 points. Bonner Springs finished with the top two games of 155 and 150 points, but an 80 in Game 5 forced the team to settle for third at 706 points.
Shawnee Mission Northwest will be represented by Thomas Gogel, Tucker Eddy, Jack Rhodes, Anni Werner-Pelofsky, Grace Ainslie along with head coach Sheryl Kaplan.
Olathe East, Olathe North, Olathe West, Olathe South and Blue Valley North advanced out of the Olathe East region. Olathe East pulled away from a tight group of Olathe teams at the top of the leader board to take first place with 814 points. Olathe East scored a region-best game score of 177 in Game 2. A few teams caught up after the Hawks scored a 92 in the next game, but 156 in Game 4 and 146 in Game 6 sealed the top spot for them. Olathe North finished runner-up with 759 points, edging out Olathe West in third place with 750. The Eagles trailed for three games before outscoring the Owls by 47 pins in Game 4.
Olathe East head coach Amy Hill will head to state with Brett Gamber, Cordell Gilhaus, Merik Dismang, John McCaskill and Sha'lyese Wright.
Goddard-Eisenhower, Garden City, Topeka Seaman, Washburn Rural and Wellsville/Eudora advanced out of the Goddard-Eisenhower region.
Goddard-Eisenhower secured the top spot in their regional with 938 points, 164 points ahead of runner-up Garden City. Goddard-Eisenhower opened with 190 points in Game 1, the best score across all three regionals. Not only that, the team scored 172 in Game 3 and 164 in Game 6 to take the top three game scores heading into state. Topeka Seaman finished in third with 741 points.
Aaron Brandt, Brody May, Hayleight Tong , Cale McConnell and Kyler Stockstill will represent the Goddard-Eisenhower team helmed by head coach Brian Adelgren.