Trevor Lawson hopes his college signing is not the last for the Seymour High School bowling program.
In the fall, he will head to Marian University in Indianapolis, where he will be a member of the men’s bowling team and study secondary education.
After seeing the SHS boys and girls teams win sectional titles this past winter, Lawson knows there’s potential for more than just him to bowl at the next level.
“I’ve actually talked to a few of my teammates about collegiate bowling. I’m trying to recruit them to Marian,” he said, smiling. “I definitely tried to talk to them about how you can achieve high academics there and also do the sport you love.”
On Sunday afternoon at Scottsburg Lanes, Lawson was joined by his family, SHS coaches and Marian coaches as he signed his national letter of intent to bowl for the NAIA program that’s a member of the Crossroads League.
This spring, the Knights placed third in the NAIA National Championships.
“I went up there just to view a practice,” Lawson said of his March visit. “I felt very welcomed from the whole team. Everybody came up to me and talked to me, and no one was shy or anything. It felt like family.”
A couple of other colleges were interested in having Lawson join their bowling team, but after the Marian visit, he knew he wanted to go there.
“It means a lot to finally know what I’ve been working for worked out for me, especially academically,” he said. “I’ve been working to get my GPA higher because I knew if I wanted to go to Marian, it’s very academically excellent.”
Reaching this level in bowling also is special because Lawson gets to continue a sport he started when he was 2 or 3.
“It has been in my family ever since my grandpa started bowling,” he said. “He taught my dad, and I would always go to the bowling alley with my dad when I was younger.”
In sixth grade, he joined the Seymour Middle School team. He helped the Owls win regional titles all three years, and he won a singles title and advanced to semistate as a seventh-grader.
In high school, he earned all-Southeastern Indiana Conference honors all four years, helped the Owls win sectional titles his sophomore and senior years and was a part of the boys team that placed 10th at the state finals and competed in the national tournament his sophomore year.
Lawson said his average went from 150 as a freshman to 200 as a senior. He attributes that to his dad, Toby Lawson, and coach, Shannon Kelly, helping him and practicing as much as possible.
Up until Trevor’s senior year, Toby helped coach the team. He then stepped aside some this past winter so he could watch his son bowl in his final year of high school.
Toby said it was great to see what Trevor accomplished from sixth through 12th grades. He’s also a proud father because Trevor is following in his footsteps, as he bowled for Vincennes University.
Another reason Trevor was drawn to Marian is the coach, Jordan Gray, has known his father for a long time and was a member of the Columbus North High School and Marian bowling teams.
As one of the Southeastern Indiana Conference’s standout bowlers, Gray said Trevor “fits the bill” in what college coaches look for in recruits.
“He brings experience at a high level,” Gray said. “He brings understanding of being on a team, being in a team atmosphere. He’s a level-headed kid, so I don’t expect him to get too high or too low, and that’s something we really look for in terms of a college bowler because there are a lot of ups, there are a lot of downs.”
The newcomers go from being the best bowler on their high school team to being on the same team, so Gray said there are growing pains, but Trevor’s level-headed nature should bode well.
“I think he’s a driven individual, and he came up to practice and we worked on some stuff, and I think he’s going to receive my coaching really well and how I phrase things because every coach does things differently,” Gray said. “I’m optimistic that he’s going to be a really good fit for us and that he’s going to really enjoy his time with us.”
Gray said Trevor is among a recruiting class of eight men and eight women who will join the Marian program in the 2021-22 school year. His wife, Jerracah Gray, is the associate head coach and primarily coaches the women’s team.
Kelly said Trevor is his third bowler to continue the sport in college.
“This works twofold for us,” Kelly said. “It gets our name out there at the school, and at the same time, it has been a few years since we had those others that had the chance to go on up. This gets that word out in the school again. Hopefully, that will help stir some people in the school, encourage some of my younger bowlers to work a little harder.”
Kelly said there are bowlers at SHS and other schools in the conference who could bowl collegiately.
“I think we’ve got several yet in the next few years that have an opportunity to do something like this,” he said. “All across the conference, we have a lot of really good bowlers coming up right now. We were sophomore and junior heavy this past year, so next year, several of the teams will have some really good seniors, and there will be a lot of good juniors in the conference next year.”
Lawrenceburg is joining the conference next season, too.
“That will add another bowling center to our mix, and it will add more bowlers and just get more people involved,” Kelly said.
Scottsburg Lanes has been the SHS team’s home since the Seymour bowling alley closed in the summer of 2016. Co-owner Lea Ann Doughty said several Scottsburg High School bowlers have moved on to bowl in college in recent years, and she’s glad to see Trevor get that opportunity, too.
“He’s an outstanding young man, very quiet, very reserved, very mature, and he just kind of takes everything in and he loves to bowl,” she said, smiling.
“We work real hard with our youth,” she said. “We just try to work with them and keep them positive and let them see the opportunities that are in front of them and help them grow into good adults. It’s tremendous that we see the end results.”
As Trevor moves on to the next level, his mother, Belinda Davis, said he’s fortunate to have a lot of good support from family and friends.
“I know the love of the game has been there since he was born basically. It was in his blood,” she said. “Just watching him grow and become more mature over the years, that has been a huge, huge thing for him. He has definitely matured a lot through the years. Bigger things are coming to him, I think, because he’s definitely ready.”
His stepmother, Jen Lawson, said it has been a pleasure to watch him bowl and also help the underclassmen throughout his high school career.
“He understands the game, and it benefited the team,” she said.