Friday, June 17, 2005 | 9:49 a.m.
Tim Mullin
SPECIAL TO THE SUN
In 1968, 16-year-old Vince Mazzanti Jr. watched his father, Vince Mazzanti Sr., bowl his way to the 1968 ABC Tournament All-Event title; ever since that day, Mazzanti Jr. has been dreaming about winning his own senior's championship.
Mazzanti Jr. said the night his father came home with the eagle trophy, he told him, "Oh, you may have a PBA title, but that eagle up there says senior, not junior, you'll never get one of them.'"
Now, 37 years later, Mazzanti Jr., 53, called his father to say only a few words -- "we're 1-1 now" -- after defeating three-time Senior tour player of the year Bob Glass 652-627 to win the 2005 ABC Senior Masters on Thursday at the Suncoast Bowling Center.
"It's like a dream come true," Mazzanti Jr. said. " I've been chasing it for 30 years, I've bowled 27 ABCs and fourth was the highest I got."
Mazzanti Jr., the 2002 PBA Senior tour rookie of the year, improved his overall record to 4-0 in match play against Glass.
"He is not too happy with me," Mazzanti Jr. said. "I got him in Tennessee in 2001, he was going for bowler of the year then, and I beat him again in Michigan. If you want to be the best, you have to beat the best and I just kept telling myself, don't let up because I'm bowling against the best."
To win a PBA title it comes down to finding the right angle before your opponent does, which is exactly what Mazzanti Jr. did to win his third professional senior tour title.
Mazzanti Jr. came out throwing strikes in three out of his first five frames, while his opponent was still looking for what approach to take.
"When your bowling against someone that is bowling as well as Vince was, you can't just go out there and say oh, try this, try that," said Glass, the 2001 ABC Senior Masters Champion. "If after 10 minutes of practice you're still trying things, than the first five frames you're still trying things and than the first game you're still trying things, you have to try something new towards the end of first and the middle of the second. Now, you don't have a chance, you can't win that way."
Mazzanti Jr. jumped out to an early 234-190 lead after the first game and never looked back.
"Well, I knew number-wise that I had so many pins, but after that I just wanted to get into a zone and there was nobody there but me and the pins," Mazzanti Jr. said. "I knew it wasn't life or death right there, I had a reprieve, but I didn't want to even give him a second chance. I wanted to put it away and end it. You can't give people like that a second chance."
Even though the pair the championship game was played on, lanes 21-22, had been used all day long, it still seemed a little oily, forcing balls to break past the usual break point, and leaving Glass, a 17-year veteran of the senior tour, confused.
"What I want to do was not going to strike," Glass said. "I tried three different balls and three different releases ... but I couldn't get the ball to react to anything I could read, so when I went left on the last pin (of frame 5), I was screwed. I was going to have to move to do something else and I couldn't do it."
As for the local competitors, Las Vegan Ron DeGroat was the only one to finish in the top 10. DeGroat took fourth after losing to Glass, 679-625.
"The lanes had broke down," DeGroat said after his loss. "I didn't get the right angle and he had the right angle. I tried to copy what he was doing, but he has eight revolutions, which is back end tilt, more than me. It is what you have to have to get the right carry angle. I couldn't quite create it and he had it really nice."
DeGroat has cashed in every event that has come to Las Vegas in his career, this time taking home $5,000.
"I don't want to be cocky, but I just expect (to cash)," DeGroat said.
As for Mazzanti Jr., he attributes at least part of his victory to a newfound interest in the psychology of bowling. He said he read three books on the subject this week alone.
"(The books) had a routine of things to do," Mazzanti Jr. said. "You know, like seeing (the ball) in your mind, picturing it after you let go of it ... So I started doing that and you and I was just trying to feel it and getting everything together."
Whether it was the psychology or not, the fact remains, Mazzanti Jr. now holds the very same eagle trophy his father taunted him with 37 years earlier.
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