PWBA Tour Championship


The PWBA Tour Championship is one of the four major events on the PWBA Tour. The tournament has been the final event of the PWBA Tour season since the Tour's rebirth in 2015. It has been held in Arlington, Texas, Midlothian, Virginia and Richmond, Virginia.

Background

The original PWBA Tour had three major events: The U.S. Women's Open, USBC Queens, and the PWBA Players Championship. When the Tour was restarted in 2015, the PWBA Tour Championship was added to serve as a season-ending playoffs.
The PWBA Tour Championship is an invitational event with a starting field of 16 players. Any full-fledged PWBA member who wins one of the prior events in the current season automatically makes the field of 16, regardless of her season point total. The remaining spots in the field are filled with the women holding the highest point totals among non-winners. Invited players are then re-seeded 1 through 16 based on season point totals.
The tournament is set up in four bracketed elimination rounds. The #5 through #16 seeds bowl in the first round, consisting of head-to-head, best three-of-five matches. The six winners join the #3 and #4 seeds in the second round, which consists of four head-to-head, best three-of-five matches. The four winners of those matches bowl head-to-head, best three-of-five matches in the third round to determine the two bowlers who will join the #1 and #2 seeds in the televised finals. The televised final round features two head-to-head, single-elimination semifinal matches, with the #1 and #2 seeds each facing one of the survivors from the third round. The two winners of those matches then square off in a single-game final match to determine the champion.
Despite being automatically placed into the televised finals, no #1 or #2 seed had ever won this tournament until 2019.

Champions

2019 Event

The was held September 15–18 at the Old Dominion Building inside the Richmond Raceway Complex. Total prize fund was $70,000, with a $20,000 top prize. Seven of the eight 2019 tournament winners participated, along with nine at-large invitees who were the point leaders among non-winners. American Shannon O'Keefe won from the #1 seed position, defeating Ukraine's Dasha Kovalova in the final match. This was O'Keefe's fifth title of the 2019 season, her 13th title overall, and her third career major. Having won the 2017 PWBA Tour Championship, O'Keefe also became the first two-time winner of this event.
Semifinal 1: Shannon O'Keefe defeated Stefanie Johnson, 234–223
Semifinal 2: Dasha Kovalova defeated Danielle McEwan, 279–230
Final match: Shannon O'Keefe defeated Dasha Kovalova, 268–179

Past winners