August 21, 2024 Nolan Hughes

In the first season of the new-look PBA Elite League presented by Snickers, the Las Vegas High Rollers head into the playoffs as the team to beat.

With a 10-4 record, the High Rollers earned the No. 1 seed and a one-round bye in the playoffs. They clinched a fourth consecutive top-four finish, which includes all four seasons in franchise history.

How did they pull it off? Let’s dig in.

Roster

Manager: Amleto Monacelli
Protected players: Andrew Anderson, AJ Johnson
Draft picks: Matt Ogle, Matt Russo (returning), Sean Rash, Thomas Larsen

The High Rollers retained most of their core and withstood a finger injury that cost Larsen several weeks of the season.

High Point: Round 12

Perhaps no team has a more clear climax to their regular season.

Anderson delivered the match-winning strike in a roll-off to beat Portland, who was tied with Las Vegas for the league’s best record. The victory put the High Rollers on top of the Elite League for good.

Anderson threw the strike in front of dozens of family and friends at Thunderbowl’s Strobl Arena, which is less than an hour from hometown.

Simply put, it was the best shot from the best team’s best player in the regular season’s biggest moment.

Low Point: Round 10

In Round 10, the High Rollers faced the league’s worst team in Sin City itself.

Sounds like an easy win, right? Not so fast.

Waco swept the match with wins of 224-212 and 211-184.

Following the mid-season break and heading into the home stretch of the season, the loss served as a wake-up call for Las Vegas. The High Rollers went 3-0 in their next matches to clinch the No. 1 seed.

Turning Point: Rounds 7-8

Las Vegas’ performance in Anderson, fittingly, solidified their standing atop the league’s hierarchy.

Anderson said the team’s practice before their Round 7 match against Akron was as bad as any practice they’ve had all season. The High Rollers responded with games of 230, 219, (plus a perfect 30 in a roll-off), 259 and 228 to win both of their matches.

Those victories propelled Las Vegas into a share of the league’s best record, which they would never relinquish.

Biggest Strength: Stability and Buy-in

The greatest asset in the High Rollers’ possession is their continuity.

Retaining a hungry and connected core of Anderson, Johnson and Russo was a strong first step. With Ogle and Rash, Roth/Holman doubles partners with innate chemistry, compounded the team’s strengths.

Larsen represented the final piece of the puzzle. Where most players would understandably struggle to handle reduced playing time on a strong team — hello, Team USA’s Jayson Tatum — Anderson and Rash went out of their way multiple times this season to emphasize how Larsen has been the consummate team player.

The High Rollers developed an identity over their first three seasons. They not only preserved it, but built upon it this year.

Biggest Weakness: Looking Too Far Ahead

It’s hard to poke a hole in anything the High Rollers have achieved this season.

To nit-pick, Las Vegas ranked fourth in average with 211.50, nearly four pins behind Motown and six pins behind Portland. But that statistic doesn’t tell the whole story; removing their final two games, which were irrelevant for seeding, would raise their average from almost two full pins.

Even losing to Waco on TV is arguably a positive sign: Portland, the No. 2 seed, also lost to the Wonders; Dallas, the league’s second-worst team by record, was the only team to beat Waco on TV.

Every team wants to win. This team hates to lose.

Find three players who outwardly look like they want to win at any cost more than Anderson, Johnson and Rash. That burning desire to succeed is why those players have reached this point in their careers and why this team earned the top seed.

But will they want to win too much? Will they try to win the Elias Cup in Game 1 of the semifinals?

Non-Bowling Team Comparison: 2024 Boston Celtics

Elite regular season team? Check.
Track record of playoff success? Check.
No championship wins with their current core? Check.

Just like basketball fans did in June, bowling fans could find themselves on Sept. 18 thinking: Of course the High Rollers won the Elias Cup.