EJ Tackett One Win From World Championship and POY 4-Peat

The final major of the 2026 PBA Tour season now has its nine-player TV field, and EJ Tackett is once again the man everyone has to chase.

After 66 games at Bowlero Brooklyn Park in Minnesota, Tackett earned the No. 1 seed for the PBA World Championship with 15,301 pins. He averaged 227 through five oil patterns and now sits one win away from his fourth consecutive PBA Players Championship title.

No player has ever won a PBA Tour event four years in a row.

Moreover, if EJ Tackett wins, he will probably end the debate about who's going to get the PBA Player of the Year award.

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Chris Via secured the No. 2 seed with 15,224 pins, followed by Bill O’Neill in third with 15,203. Kris Prather climbed into fourth with 15,112, giving those three players, together with Tackett, direct spots in the championship round on June 13.

Jason Belmonte finished fifth with 15,075, while Brandon Bonta took sixth with 15,012. Zach Wilkins qualified seventh with 14,832, Jason Sterner finished eighth with 14,788, and Darren Tang claimed the ninth and final stepladder spot with 14,720. This will be Tang’s first TV-round appearance as a two-hander in a PBA Tour major event.

These five players will meet in the first double stepladder finals on June 13 at 11 a.m. ET on CBS Sports Network. The winner of that opening stepladder will become the No. 5 seed for the final championship show which will air June 13 at 1 p.m. ET on CBS and Paramount+.

2026 U.S. Open winner Patrick Dombrowski was the first player outside the cut. He finished 10th with 14,703, missing the TV finals by 17 pins.

Full PBA World Championship standings can be found here.

The PBA Tour will now take a short two-day break before the World Series of Bowling XVII resumes with the animal pattern championship finals from May 9-12 in Minnesota.

Each animal pattern final will be broadcast live on CBS Sports Network.

PBA World Series of Bowling XVII TV Schedule

Saturday, May 9

2:00 p.m. - PBA50 Ballard Championship finals
3:00 p.m. - PBA Cheetah Championship semifinals
5:00 p.m. - PBA Cheetah Championship finals

Sunday, May 10

2:00 p.m. - PBA50 Monacelli Championship finals
3:00 p.m. - PBA Chameleon Championship semifinals
5:00 p.m. - PBA Chameleon Championship finals

Monday, May 11

5:00 p.m. - PBA50 Petraglia Championship finals
6:00 p.m. - PBA Scorpion Championship semifinals
8:00 p.m. - PBA Scorpion Championship finals

Tuesday, May 12

5:00 p.m. - PBA50 World Championship finals
6:00 p.m. - PBA Shark Championship semifinals
8:00 p.m. - PBA Shark Championship finals

Saturday, June 13

11:00 a.m. - PBA World Championship semifinals on CBS Sports Network
1:00 p.m. - PBA World Championship finals on CBS and Paramount+