Max Cavender Competes at World Bowls Junior Cup in Warilla Australia

Competing in his first international lawn bowls tournament, Max Cavender, 18, of Milwaukee Wisconsin stepped into the spotlight at the World Junior Cup in Warilla Australia, April 12-20.  Max competed in Group 2 against bowlers from Brunei, Canada, Guernsey, China, Malaysia, New Zealand, and Scotland.  Playing in his third match of the tournament, Max beat Malaysia.  After dropping the opening set, Max found his form and came back to win the second set and then dominated the tie-breaker to secure the match at 6-8, 8-6, 5-0. This match was followed up by a loss against undefeated Craig Watson of Scotland by a score of 6-9, 2-13.  In the opening match of the tournament, Max came close to pushing Japan to a tie-breaker but dropped the match 8-12, 7-7.  He suffered another loss to Guernsey at 6-9, 4-11 before his victory over Malaysia.  Finding his form, Max won his two matches in straight sets against Hong Kong China 8-6, 10-9 and Canada 8-5, 9-5.  Winning three of his last four matches, Max had a record of 3-3 and sat in 5th place in his section with one match remaining.  Max dropped his final game to New Zealand by a score of 9-13, 4-13, then completed the round robin section play with a 3-4 record and 6th place.

Max acquitted himself well in his first international tournament, competing against some of the world’s best junior lawn bowlers.  He is the first US representative in recent memory to complete in the under 25 world juniors tournament.