Most local bowlers were wondering if the 300 game would ever come. The closest anyone had come before was a game of 298 by Clint Jost some 25 years ago.

After the first six frames, his fellow bowlers started to give his game their full attention. As he approached the ninth and 10^th frames, all bowling stopped on the other lanes as they watched and wondered if this could finally be the first 300 in Springs history.

Greg admits to getting a little nervous as he let the 11^th ball go. He didn’t want to go light, so he over compensated a little and the ball headed off to the left, but he was happy to see all 10 pins go down from the left “Brooklyn” side.

As Greg came to the line for the 12^th and final ball, he knew that the pressure on that last shot has spoiled many 300 games. He pulled himself together… all eyes were on him. You could have heard a pin drop. He let it go and it struck right in the pocket and the pins all fell down.

His fellow bowlers, for the most part, just stood in stunned silence, taking a while to realize they had just witnessed the first 300 game in Wessington Springs history.

Greg has always kept an unofficial bucket list on things he has wanted to accomplish in sports. Many he has already crossed off: he scored 50 points in a basketball game once; he hit three home runs in a baseball game; won two season championships in stock car racing; and now he has added a 300 game in bowling.

There is pretty much only one thing left on his bucket list: he wants to get a hole in one in golf some day.

Bowling goes back a long way in Wessington Springs. The first alley was started up in January of 1907, over a century ago. There were several other small alleys, mostly in basements of downtown buildings until Bernard Krueger built the town’s first modern six-lane bowling alley in 1959 with automatic pin setters coming a year or two later.

It took 103 years to get that first 300. Now that the first one is out of the way, maybe the next one won’t take so long.