When the NCAA rolls out its first National Collegiate Women's Bowling Championship in early April, Bobby Henderson will be expecting big excitement.

"We're looking at being a part of history," said the NCAA Women's Bowling Committee member and head women's bowling coach at Fayetteville State University.

Less than a year ago, the then-emerging sport of women's bowling reached the sponsorship necessary to support an NCAA championship. NCAA legislation that allows a championship for an emerging sport to be established within a year after the minimum sponsorship number is achieved produced a few months of frantic but focused planning -- which included establishing the Women's Bowling Committee itself -- to produce the championship.

Those efforts will culminate April 8-10 when the field of eight five-member teams gathers at Houston's Emerald Bowl to vie for the first national crown.

The site is one of two bids the committee received. Committee Chair Juli Peterson, senior woman administrator and assistant director of athletics at St. Peter's College, said of the two, the Emerald Bowl could accommodate more spectators. Even so, extra seating will be installed for the expected crowd of about 400 to 450.

Format determined

The three-day tournament features a combination of team competition and Baker format. According to Keanah Smith, NCAA assistant director of championships, each squad will bowl seven team games, in which each player's pinfall counts toward the total team score, as well as several games in the Baker format, in which each member of the team bowls two frames of a 10-frame game, to determine the seeding for the double-elimination national championship. Teams then will collide in best-of-seven Baker series once championship competition gets under way.

Peterson said in selecting the championship format, the committee was careful to ensure that no team gained an advantage.

"Some teams are better at Baker and some teams are better at team games," she said. "So we wanted a mixture of everything to make it a level playing field for every team across the board."

Henderson said a number of formats were considered before finally settling on the mixture of Baker and pinfall, in part because all teams would be familiar with both formats.

"When you look at all the teams and all the formats, everybody has done one or the other or a combination of both," he said. "This was the best for what we wanted, especially in terms of it being televised and the fact that everyone has participated in both forms."

Competitive field?

Despite this being the first year for the NCAA championship, most people expect tournament competition to be fierce.

"Right now each region has so many strong teams that I don't think one will dominate the field over the next few years," Peterson said.

But Ron Holmes, head coach at Central Missouri State University, said that while teams at the championship level will stage a competitive event, there may be a lack of parity for a while throughout the sport.

"There are some teams that just picked it up recently or haven't had the best opportunity to go out and compete against higher-quality schools, or maybe they don't have a coach who gets to spend as much time with bowling," Holmes said. "But that will all of a sudden catch up when those teams see the difference in those things."

Henderson said Holmes is right.

"Some teams have been bowling 10 or more years and some teams have been bowling four or fewer years. There's no question there's going to be different levels of parity," Henderson said. "Some have been participants in College Bowling USA, so they've been to tournaments and are going to have a slight advantage. But when it gets down to picking the eight, I think the level is going to be equal."

Different than before

But Henderson said the parity issues should be resolved quickly.

"With the exception of the relatively new conferences and new schools, they may be at a disadvantage for the first year," he said. "But I'll say within the next two to three years, everybody will be on the same level."

Holmes hopes the event goes as smoothly as possible, that everyone has an opportunity to compete against some of the schools that they don't get a chance to see during the season, and that they develop a new love and appreciation for the game.

"The expectation is that everyone would come, have a wonderful time and have an opportunity to experience bowling as an NCAA championship, because it may end up being different than the previous system," he said.

Up until now, most teams have been competing in the Intercollegiate Bowling Championships (IBC), which are administered by College Bowling USA, a primary resource and a governing body for the sport. Now teams will be allowed to compete in both the NCAA and the IBC championships.

Peterson also expects the championship to look and feel differently operationally now that the championship is under the NCAA's direction.

"I've been involved with NCAA championships for a few years. It'll definitely be exciting to see how the NCAA runs the women's bowling championship compared to the way it has been run in the past," she said.

Holmes, whose Central Missouri State team is the defending IBC champion, said he doesn't think teams that have played in the previous system will see many changes as far as how the game is played. The rules and format for the NCAA championship are based on the previous system. But Holmes said the atmosphere and the different types of things that go on during the championship may differ.

"It will be different from the sense that this is another sport that the NCAA runs and there is a specific system and a specific standard. That's not to say the other championship wasn't that way, too. It'll just be a different structure," he said.

Sponsorship growth

Henderson said he expects the championship to draw attention to the sport, which he says should increase the number of sponsoring institutions. The fact the championship will be televised (April 11 on ESPN2) also adds appeal.

Peterson speculated that teams currently at the club level will start considering varsity status. "And some schools that don't have it at all will go ahead and pick it up," she said, noting that the sport is inexpensive and Title IX friendly.

An increase in the number of NCAA women's bowling teams plays into at least one of the ways Henderson would like to see the championship evolve.

"I think one of the first things we as a committee will be looking at is increasing the number of schools involved in the championship," he said. "This year we're talking about eight. Hopefully, we can get a flood of schools to come in and we can increase that number."

According to the NCAA's Smith, there are 180 club teams currently in operation at NCAA institutions.

"We anticipate that the vast majority of those teams will change to NCAA status over the next few years," she said.

Holmes said he would like to see an expanded bracket that includes play at regional sites before advancing to the finals. He said he'd also like to see future championships contested in an arena setting.

"I think there's a tremendous interest in having it in an arena setting. I think the only reason it wasn't done this first year was because of the limited time frame in putting the event together," he said. "If there was an option to have a small arena or even a medium sized arena, have eight lanes developed, I think that would be a wonderful option."