Hooper is No.1 at Poverty Bay

Men's junior fours champs: Poverty Bay's men's junior fours champions are (from left) Dusty Miller, Otto Louw, Andrew Ball and Dawson Owen.

DAVE Hooper is back at the top of Poverty Bay's men's singles bowls.

Hooper defeated Lex Kennedy 22-13 to win the men's open singles six seasons after winning it as a junior.

Using the two-life format and playing first to 21 or for one hour and 45 minutes, eight rounds were required to declare Hooper the champion.

Going into the final, he and Kennedy were both on one life.

Hooper grabbed four points on the eighth end to go 8-6 ahead only for Kennedy to reciprocate on the ninth end to take a 10-8 advantage.

From there, however, Hooper progressed comfortably to win 22-13.

The pair also met in the fifth round in a nail-biting clash that was locked 15-15 after 18 ends. Hooper got one point on the last end to win 16-15.

On their journeys to the final, Hooper lost a life to Steve Berezowski 11-20 and Kennedy beat Berezowski 17-15.

Hooper won the men's open singles as a junior in the 2014-15 season. He was defeated in the junior championship that season but went on the win the open crown.

Two juniors competed in the open singles and both did well.

Dawson Owen beat Peter Walters 21-20 in the first round and Berezowski 17-12 in the second, but was defeated by Berezowski 22-11 in the fourth round.

John Andrews, a second-year player, beat Walters 21-9 in the second round but lost his next two games. He did well and is a promising junior player.

The women's open singles final is yet to be played.

■ Poverty Bay's junior fours were completed in one twilight session, with two teams in each championship.

The winning women's team were Kim Walters (skip), Robyn Arthur (director), Joan Gledhill (2) and Norma Miller (lead).

They had two wins over Kathryn Flaugere (s), Kandyce Bevan (d), Anna Colvin (2) and Trish Leach (l).

In the first round, Walters' team were seven points but a three on the fourth end gave them momentum and they went on to win 14-9.

The second game was close. Walters led the 12-end game 8-7 after 11 ends but were down in the last end.

With her last bowl, Walters knocked one of her team's bowls closer to the jack for a 9-7 victory and the title.

Walters had the more experienced juniors in her crew while two-first year players in Flaugere's team — Bevan and Colvin — played well and gained valuable competition experience.

The men's junior fours was won by Dawson Owen (s), Andrew Ball (d), Otto Louw (2) and Dusty Miller (l).

They won the 13-7 and 14-5 against a much-less-experienced team of Richard Jones (s), John Leahy (d), Chris Valentine (2) and John Andrews (l).

The competition was closer than the final scores indicated.

Jones's four got a good start in both games.

In the first round clash, the score was 4 all after four ends and Jones's team were only 6-4 down after six ends when Owen's team advanced their lead.

In the second round, it was only 5-4 to Owen's team after seven rounds before they again moved ahead to win.