Sask. teen scores rare perfect game in five pin bowling

Tanner Pollock lines up his throw as Biggar Bowl owner Melissa Raschke watches from a distance.

A Saskatchewan teenager has joined an elite group of bowlers after striking a perfect game last weekend.

At just 14 years old, Tanner Pollock achieved the rare feat that most people never experience in their lifetime.

“It just took going nearly every day and lots of practice,” he told CTV News.

Pollock, who is in Grade 9, spends most of his spare time at the local bowling alley in Biggar, Sask.

He picked up the sport again about a year ago, after first trying it when he was seven years old. This past fall, he set his sights on bowling a perfect game.

In five pin bowling, a perfect game consists of 12 consecutive strikes totaling 450 points.

Pollock’s come close before. He’ll often score 200, 300 or 400-plus points in a game.

“It’s happened before where I’ve gone all the way to 11 strikes down to the last throw. But usually I missed it,” Pollock said.

On Sunday, he didn’t necessarily set out to score a perfect game. He played 22 games that day, during glow bowling. It wasn’t until his last game that he struck perfection.

“I started getting strikes and strikes. I wasn’t evening paying attention to what my score was,” he said.

During the tenth frame, youth bowling coach and owner of Biggar Bowl Melissa Raschke started filming Pollock. She does that every time he gets close to reaching the pinnacle, hoping to capture his reaction.

This time, she did. The video shows Pollock jumping in the air and letting out a short cheer after hitting his twelfth consecutive strike.

“It’s amazing that Tanner was able to do this and that I got to witness it,” said Raschke, who’s never seen someone score a perfect game. “It’s not a very common thing.”

Raschke said it’s even more rare – and challenging – to throw a perfect game on wooden lanes, like the ones inside Biggar’s bowling alley.

Most bowling alleys have switched to synthetic lanes. On those, the same throw typically produces the same result, Raschke said. That isn’t the case with wooden lanes. Each lane can differ based on how they are oiled and develop grooves over time, which impacts the movement of the ball.

But Pollock’s biggest challenge doesn’t appear to be the lanes. Instead, it’s performing in big crowds or during league games.

“When there’s a lot more people it’s harder to bowl,” he said.

Pollock does his best when he’s with a small group of people, bowling in the middle lanes and listening to Queen play through the sound system. That was the atmosphere when he scored his perfect game on Sunday.

“We don’t quite often get to see him practice just because he likes to come down and do it on his own,” said Pollock’s dad, Kyle, who was able to see his son’s perfect game thanks to Raschke’s recording.

“(I had) butterflies in my stomach seeing that thrill and that joy for him was really incredible.”

The Canadian Five Pin Bowlers Association sanctioned just 13 perfect games in the 2024-25 season.

Pollock’s game will not be sanctioned under the association’s guidelines because it was not scored during league play or a tournament.

Along with pride, Pollock received $1,000 from the bowling alley for throwing a perfect game. He plans to put that towards buying new bowling balls, shoes and a bag to help him chase his next goal of performing well during a provincial tournament.