Bowlers Journal to Sponsor PBA Scorpion Championships.

In celebration of its 100th anniversary, Bowlers Journal International magazine - America’s oldest continuously-published monthly sports magazine – has been named titled sponsor of the Bowlers Journal PBA Scorpion Championship which will be held during PBA World Series of Bowling IV.

"We are thrilled to launch our 100th Anniversary promotion campaign by sponsoring a PBA event," said Luby Publishing President Keith Hamilton. "It’s great to be working with the PBA again."

Qualifying and match play in the Bowlers Journal PBA Scorpion Championship will be held on Tuesday, Nov. 6, at South Point Bowling Center in Las Vegas with the four-player stepladder finals set for Sunday, Nov. 11, on the special WSOB lane installation in South Point Exhibition Hall A. The 90-minute finals will air on ESPN on Sunday, Jan. 6, at 1 p.m. ET.

The qualifying and match play rounds on Nov. 6 will be webcast live, exclusively on PBA’s Xtra Frame online bowling channel.

"The entire bowling community can be proud of this milestone year for Bowlers Journal. For the magazine to consistently provide the highest quality of coverage of the entire industry for a century is remarkable," said PBA Commissioner Tom Clark. "The PBA is proud to partner with Bowlers Journal at the World Series for the Scorpion Championship and to help make a worldwide audience aware of the magazine's rich history."

Bowlers Journal International was founded in 1913 by Dave Luby. It has covered the sport from the days of pinboys through the introduction of automatic scoring, the evolution of televised bowling, leagues, tournaments and all aspects of bowling ball and lane technology. “The BJ” has done more to cover the business, recreational and sport sides of bowling around the world than any other publication under the leadership of Dave Luby, his son Mort, and later his grandson Mort Jr. In 1994, Mort Luby Jr. sold the company to long-time employees Keith Hamilton and Mike Panozzo. Today, it remains bowling’s foremost magazine.

The magazine has evolved over the years. It began as “The National Bowlers Journal and Billiard Revue.” In 1988, the company changed its corporate name from National Bowlers Journal, Inc. to Luby Publishing Inc. Currently Bowlers Journal also delivers both consumer and bowling business news and information to an international audience through BowlersJournal.com, The BJI Cyber Report and e-bowler.

The PBA Scorpion Open Sunday on ESPN

England’s Dom Barrett, fully recovered from a broken collar bone sustained nine months earlier in a near-tragic all-terrain vehicle accident in Saudi Arabia, will lead the field of four finalists into the battle for the Professional Bowlers Association’s Scorpion Open title Sunday at 3 p.m. ET on ESPN.

Also on Sunday, PBA fans will be able to watch the final rounds of the Xtra Frame Ricart Ford Open presented by Columbia 300 live on the Internet from Sequoia Pro Bowl in Columbus, Ohio.

The Scorpion Open is the third of four PBA “animal pattern” championships conducted during the World Series of Bowling at South Point Casino and Hotel in Las Vegas.

Barrett’s Scorpion Open opponents will include Dave Wodka of Henderson, NV, who won his only PBA Tour title in the 1999 Greater Detroit Open; Sean Rash of suburban Chicago (Montgomery,) IL, who qualified for the ESPN finals in a record six PBA World Series of Bowling events, and 13-time PBA Tour titlist Patrick Allen of Baltimore, who is seeking his first title in two years.

Barrett earned the top qualifier position for the Scorpion finals by averaging 233.14 over 14 qualifying games, posting a 3,264 pinfall total. Wodka finished 17 pins behind, followed by Rash and Allen.

Barrett, who qualified for the end-of-season PBA Tournament of Champions by winning a PBA West Regional title in Reno, NV, just before the World Series of Bowling, hopes to join fellow British competitor Stuart Williams as the second English player to win a PBA Tour title. Williams won his first PBA Tour title in the Bayer Viper Open.

“I came (to the United States) to win one of these tournaments,” Barrett said. “Winning the regional gave me a lot of confidence. This is going to be my first (PBA) show and I couldn’t be happier.”

Sunday’s ESPN eliminator-format finals will feature three one-game rounds. All four players bowl the opening game, with the lowest-scoring player after each game being eliminated. In the two rounds to follow, the same “low man out” format applies. In the title match, the two surviving players will bowl for a $15,000 first prize, a PBA Tour title and a berth in the Round of 36 for the end-of-season PBA Tournament of Champions.

In addition to the other benefits, Barrett hopes to become the fourth straight international player to win a World Series of Bowling title. Rash, a four-time PBA Tour champion, is trying for his first title since the 2007 USBC Masters.

The Xtra Frame Ricart Ford Open presented by Columbia 300 will be webcast live in its entirety on pba.com’s online bowling channel, Xtra Frame, including Saturday’s qualifying rounds and Sunday’s match play competition. Saturday’s schedule includes nine-game qualifying rounds for Squads A and B at 9 a.m. and 4 p.m. ET, with the top 24 qualifiers advancing to match play Sunday. Sunday’s live coverage will include round-robin match play sessions at 9 a.m. and 1:30 p.m., with the top four advancing to the live stepladder finals at 6 p.m.

A Scorpion Open pre-event show will be webcast at no cost on pba.com’s Xtra Frame online bowling channel starting Wednesday, with a follow-up post-game show immediately following Sunday’s ESPN telecast. To subscribe to Xtra Frame, visit pba.com and click on the Xtra Frame logo.