The girls fell by a final score of 3,126 pins to 2,244; the Bobcat boys lost 3,227-3,033.

The MHS boys cleared the 3,000 total score mark for the third meet in a row, but the Railsplitters had an impressive Round 1 led by a 501 series from DJ Armstrong to put MHS in a 242-pin deficit heading to Bakers.

Cayden Slifer led the Bobcats with a 438 series, including a high game of 259. Jayden Beichley rolled a 422 with a pair of 200-plus games, Carter McCready had a 413 series and Aiden Cowan and Porter Niedermann rolled in with 358 and 350 two-game totals.

MHS outscored Lincoln in every Baker round but just couldn’t make up enough pins to reel in the Rails.

“Cayden has been kind of struggling this year, so it was good to see him bowl that,” MHS head coach Nate Clark said. “We battled back well with the Bakers, made a few mistakes but still did very well.”

On the girls’ side, the Bobcats were outmatched by a Lincoln team that was last year’s 3A team state runner-up.

Lincoln’s Vicki Andrews led the way for all bowlers on Tuesday with a 526 series, including a 290 high game with a first-frame spare followed by 11 consecutive strikes.

“If they don’t win state this year, I’d be surprised,” MHS head coach Dustin Peterson said. “Ultimately we had some good games and some OK games.”

Devin Peterson led the way with a 349 series and a high game of 201, followed by Camillya Thomas with a 312 and Sydney May at 304. Kenedy Lammert and Ariana Villagomez scored 277 and 272 pins to round out the scoring five for the Bobcats.

“Devin rolled a 262 at Charles City [against Mason City] and it was good to see Devin continue to bowl well and show that that wasn’t a fluke,” Dustin Peterson said. “Three girls in the three hundreds is always good to see and the other two are right there. … We’ve been struggling with some minor injuries that affected our bakers a bit, Kenedy’s been fighting through something that we’re trying to pinpoint but it was good to see her come back and battle through when we needed her.”

Marshalltown heads to Ottumwa on Saturday for the Bulldogs’ bowling invite at Champion Bowl.