16 players go undefeated on Day 1 of match play at 2026 USBC Masters
March 28, 2026
Deo Benard of Roanoke, Texas, delivers a shot during his Round 2 Winners Bracket matchup against USBC and PBA Hall of Famer Parker Bohn III of Jackson, New Jersey, during bracket match-play competition at the 2026 USBC Masters at Thunderbowl Lanes in Allen Park, Michigan, on Friday. Benard finished the day's action with a 2-0 record while Bohn posted a 2-1 mark to stay alive in the tourmanent's Elimination Bracket.
BRACKETS
ALLEN PARK, Michigan – Friday marked the opening day of bracket match play at the 2026 United States Bowling Congress Masters, which is taking place at Thunderbowl Lanes in Allen Park, Michigan.
The large crowd in attendance saw a little bit of everything over the course of four rounds and 10 hours of action-packed competition, including four perfect games and multiple matches that came down to the very last shot.
When the dust cleared, 16 bowlers managed to maintain perfect records at 2-0, 16 more walked away from Thunderbowl at 2-1 and 32 others just walked away after having been eliminated from this year’s tournament.
By and large, it was a successful day for the favorites as seven of the top 10 seeds remained alive on Friday with five of them staying unbeaten.
That list includes second-seeded Eric Jones of Edmond, Oklahoma; No. 3 Deo Benard of Roanoke, Texas; fourth-seed Spencer Robarge of Springfield, Missouri, and Sweden’s Jesper Svensson and Matt Russo of O’Fallon, Missouri, who entered match play seeded sixth and seventh, respectively.
Outstanding performances were authored by those who qualified lower in the standings as well as four-time Masters champion Jason Belmonte of Australia, three-time reigning Professional Bowlers Association Player of the Year EJ Tackett of Ossian, Indiana, and two-time U.S. Open champ Francois Lavoie of Canada also finished 2-0 on Friday.
There is still plenty of firepower to be found within the Elimination Bracket too, however, as six major champions stayed alive by winning two out of three matches on the opening day of bracket match-play competition.
Included on that roster are defending Masters champion Gary Haines of Babylon, New York; PBA legend Parker Bohn III of Jackson, New Jersey; rookie Brandon Bonta of Wichita, Kansas, who fired a 300 game in the title match en route to a win at the season-opening PBA Players Championship and England’s Dom Barrett, who would complete the career grand slam if he could reach the winner’s circle this week in Detroit.
Bohn clearly remains a crowd favorite as substantial galleries formed behind his pairs of lanes during all three of his matches on Friday.
The 62-year-old USBC and PBA Hall of Famer thrilled his supporters by defeating Singapore’s Nu’man Syahmi Yusri by a score of 681-566 during the opening round of three-game, total-pinfall matches.
Bohn couldn’t keep the momentum going, however, as he fell to Benard, 678-657, in Round 2 to drop into the Elimination Bracket – Benard earned his place in that match by taking down Charles Easton of Toledo, Ohio, 788-621, in Round 1.
Benard had mixed feelings about the outcome of his battle with Bohn. On one hand, he was thrilled to have ended Day 1 of match play at 2-0. On the other, he hated having to take down a bowler he idolized while growing up in order to do so.
“I didn’t want to bowl Parker (Bohn) today because I want both of us to make the show,” Benard said. “I grew up watching him, so it was surreal to be out here going against him.”
Bohn nearly was forced to contend with a surreal situation of his own, bowling against his own flesh and blood.
By winning a match before losing to Benard, Bohn entered the Elimination Bracket in Round 2. There, he would face the winner of the matchup between his son Brandon and Steve Novak of Louisville, Kentucky.
The Bohn v. Bohn battle never materialized, however, as Novak took down Brandon Bohn, also of Jackson, New Jersey, by a final score of 781-649.
With family ties no longer in play, Parker Bohn defeated Novak, 613-549, during Round 2 of Elimination Bracket play to finish Friday’s action at 2-1 and move on to Saturday’s final day bracket match-play competition at this year’s Masters.
Bohn will start his day with a match against Bonta. Should he win that, the legendary left-hander would then need to rattle off four additional victories to make it to the Elimination Bracket finals, where four bowlers will go head-to-head to determine the Nos. 3, 4 and 5 seeds for Sunday’s stepladder finals, which will be broadcast live on The CW at 4 p.m. Eastern.
The top two seeds for the stepladder will be determined on Saturday when the tournament’s final two undefeated bowlers square off. The athlete who wins that matchup will earn the No. 1 seed for Sunday’s TV finals and sit just one victory away from capturing a PBA major title, a place in history and the Masters’ $100,000 first-place prize. The bowler who falls short in the final Winners Bracket contest will be seeded No. 2.
Clearly, the path to victory will be long and challenging for Bohn and the other 15 competitors who dropped into the Elimination Bracket on Friday.
Benard knows the importance of staying undefeated as long as possible at the Masters. As such, he was very pleased with the results he enjoyed on the opening day of matches.
“Going 2-0 in the Winners Bracket is always the best possible outcome, so today was excellent,” Benard said. “I was super fortunate during my match with Parker (Bohn). He bowled really well, and the pair got super tricky. I got a little trapped in what ball I was trying to throw, but I started to see the lanes pretty well again once I got ahead of it.”
Benard hopes to remain ahead of the game during his Round 3 matchup against Matt Sanders of Evansville, Indiana, which will start on Saturday morning at 10 a.m. Eastern at Thunderbowl Lanes.
Sanders got to 2-0 by topping Garrett Meadows of Springfield, Virginia, 710-677, and Canada’s Zach Wilkins, 736-578, on Friday.
As impressive as Sanders’ 241 average was during his pair of wins on Friday, it was not the highest mark in the match-play field.
Robarge (251.2) and Tackett (250.5) each posted averages in excess of 250 on Friday while Belmonte surpassed the 260 mark at 262.3.
The PBA Tour’s record holder for all-time major victories (15) established that average and remained undefeated courtesy of wins over Manuel Otalora of Davie, Florida, 785-585, and Kyle Troup of Mt. Washington, Kentucky, 789-667.
But neither Belmonte, Robarge nor Tackett achieved perfection on Friday. That honor was reserved for Brandon Bohn, Russo, Haines and Alec Keplinger of Quincy, Michigan, all of whom shot 300 during Day 1 of match play.
Russo, Haines and Keplinger will try to duplicate those performances during Saturday’s final day of bracket competition at this year’s Masters, at the end of which the five stepladder finalists will be determined.
All rounds leading up to the televised finals will stream live exclusively on BowlTV.
The 2026 USBC Masters marks the return of the traditional five-player stepladder finals format for the live television broadcast, which means the top seed for the finals will need to be defeated only once during the championship match.
CLICK HERE for more information on the USBC Masters.
BRACKETS
ALLEN PARK, Michigan – Friday marked the opening day of bracket match play at the 2026 United States Bowling Congress Masters, which is taking place at Thunderbowl Lanes in Allen Park, Michigan.
The large crowd in attendance saw a little bit of everything over the course of four rounds and 10 hours of action-packed competition, including four perfect games and multiple matches that came down to the very last shot.
When the dust cleared, 16 bowlers managed to maintain perfect records at 2-0, 16 more walked away from Thunderbowl at 2-1 and 32 others just walked away after having been eliminated from this year’s tournament.
By and large, it was a successful day for the favorites as seven of the top 10 seeds remained alive on Friday with five of them staying unbeaten.
That list includes second-seeded Eric Jones of Edmond, Oklahoma; No. 3 Deo Benard of Roanoke, Texas; fourth-seed Spencer Robarge of Springfield, Missouri, and Sweden’s Jesper Svensson and Matt Russo of O’Fallon, Missouri, who entered match play seeded sixth and seventh, respectively.
Outstanding performances were authored by those who qualified lower in the standings as well as four-time Masters champion Jason Belmonte of Australia, three-time reigning Professional Bowlers Association Player of the Year EJ Tackett of Ossian, Indiana, and two-time U.S. Open champ Francois Lavoie of Canada also finished 2-0 on Friday.
There is still plenty of firepower to be found within the Elimination Bracket too, however, as six major champions stayed alive by winning two out of three matches on the opening day of bracket match-play competition.
Included on that roster are defending Masters champion Gary Haines of Babylon, New York; PBA legend Parker Bohn III of Jackson, New Jersey; rookie Brandon Bonta of Wichita, Kansas, who fired a 300 game in the title match en route to a win at the season-opening PBA Players Championship and England’s Dom Barrett, who would complete the career grand slam if he could reach the winner’s circle this week in Detroit.
Bohn clearly remains a crowd favorite as substantial galleries formed behind his pairs of lanes during all three of his matches on Friday.
The 62-year-old USBC and PBA Hall of Famer thrilled his supporters by defeating Singapore’s Nu’man Syahmi Yusri by a score of 681-566 during the opening round of three-game, total-pinfall matches.
Bohn couldn’t keep the momentum going, however, as he fell to Benard, 678-657, in Round 2 to drop into the Elimination Bracket – Benard earned his place in that match by taking down Charles Easton of Toledo, Ohio, 788-621, in Round 1.
Benard had mixed feelings about the outcome of his battle with Bohn. On one hand, he was thrilled to have ended Day 1 of match play at 2-0. On the other, he hated having to take down a bowler he idolized while growing up in order to do so.
“I didn’t want to bowl Parker (Bohn) today because I want both of us to make the show,” Benard said. “I grew up watching him, so it was surreal to be out here going against him.”
Bohn nearly was forced to contend with a surreal situation of his own, bowling against his own flesh and blood.
By winning a match before losing to Benard, Bohn entered the Elimination Bracket in Round 2. There, he would face the winner of the matchup between his son Brandon and Steve Novak of Louisville, Kentucky.
The Bohn v. Bohn battle never materialized, however, as Novak took down Brandon Bohn, also of Jackson, New Jersey, by a final score of 781-649.
With family ties no longer in play, Parker Bohn defeated Novak, 613-549, during Round 2 of Elimination Bracket play to finish Friday’s action at 2-1 and move on to Saturday’s final day bracket match-play competition at this year’s Masters.
Bohn will start his day with a match against Bonta. Should he win that, the legendary left-hander would then need to rattle off four additional victories to make it to the Elimination Bracket finals, where four bowlers will go head-to-head to determine the Nos. 3, 4 and 5 seeds for Sunday’s stepladder finals, which will be broadcast live on The CW at 4 p.m. Eastern.
The top two seeds for the stepladder will be determined on Saturday when the tournament’s final two undefeated bowlers square off. The athlete who wins that matchup will earn the No. 1 seed for Sunday’s TV finals and sit just one victory away from capturing a PBA major title, a place in history and the Masters’ $100,000 first-place prize. The bowler who falls short in the final Winners Bracket contest will be seeded No. 2.
Clearly, the path to victory will be long and challenging for Bohn and the other 15 competitors who dropped into the Elimination Bracket on Friday.
Benard knows the importance of staying undefeated as long as possible at the Masters. As such, he was very pleased with the results he enjoyed on the opening day of matches.
“Going 2-0 in the Winners Bracket is always the best possible outcome, so today was excellent,” Benard said. “I was super fortunate during my match with Parker (Bohn). He bowled really well, and the pair got super tricky. I got a little trapped in what ball I was trying to throw, but I started to see the lanes pretty well again once I got ahead of it.”
Benard hopes to remain ahead of the game during his Round 3 matchup against Matt Sanders of Evansville, Indiana, which will start on Saturday morning at 10 a.m. Eastern at Thunderbowl Lanes.
Sanders got to 2-0 by topping Garrett Meadows of Springfield, Virginia, 710-677, and Canada’s Zach Wilkins, 736-578, on Friday.
As impressive as Sanders’ 241 average was during his pair of wins on Friday, it was not the highest mark in the match-play field.
Robarge (251.2) and Tackett (250.5) each posted averages in excess of 250 on Friday while Belmonte surpassed the 260 mark at 262.3.
The PBA Tour’s record holder for all-time major victories (15) established that average and remained undefeated courtesy of wins over Manuel Otalora of Davie, Florida, 785-585, and Kyle Troup of Mt. Washington, Kentucky, 789-667.
But neither Belmonte, Robarge nor Tackett achieved perfection on Friday. That honor was reserved for Brandon Bohn, Russo, Haines and Alec Keplinger of Quincy, Michigan, all of whom shot 300 during Day 1 of match play.
Russo, Haines and Keplinger will try to duplicate those performances during Saturday’s final day of bracket competition at this year’s Masters, at the end of which the five stepladder finalists will be determined.
All rounds leading up to the televised finals will stream live exclusively on BowlTV.
The 2026 USBC Masters marks the return of the traditional five-player stepladder finals format for the live television broadcast, which means the top seed for the finals will need to be defeated only once during the championship match.
CLICK HERE for more information on the USBC Masters.