Bringing Everyone to Nationals

Dormant threads from the high school sections are preserved here.
Locked
High Dependency Unit
Yuna
Posts: 864
Joined: Thu Nov 15, 2012 6:45 pm

Bringing Everyone to Nationals

Post by High Dependency Unit »

My team has qualified one team for NSC, and we may end up qualifying another one. Currently we are discussing what to do if we do qualify a 2nd team (we have a fairly good chance-we haven't brought a full roster to any tournament yet) and the overwhelming opinion is that all 14-15 players on the squad should go if they want to attend, which I disagree with completely (I'm sure you'll agree with me on this-"everyone" includes players getting under 5 ppg on A-sets). How do I convince my team otherwise?
Michael Borecki
Middlesex Middle '13,
Darien (co-captain) '17,
Bowdoin College (club president) '21
User avatar
KnicksRule
Wakka
Posts: 106
Joined: Tue Jun 11, 2013 11:29 pm

Re: Bringing Everyone to Nationals

Post by KnicksRule »

I would personally leave that decision up to your coach. While I understand why you don't want that many people to "earn" the same achievement as you even if their contribution is lower, this is true with any type of team. It is also not good for the team dynamic to have that attitude. Even if your school brings more students to nationals, I am almost positive that it won't cut into your playing time.
Abhinav Kurada
AMSA Charter School '12-'16
Captain '13-'16
2x winner of United States Geography Olympiad (2013, 2014); USGO International Team Member (2015)
SSNCT Runner-Up (2014); T-21 HSNCT (2015)
jonah
Auron
Posts: 2383
Joined: Thu Jul 20, 2006 5:51 pm
Location: Chicago

Re: Bringing Everyone to Nationals

Post by jonah »

According to the latest version of the PACE rules I can find (2012), rosters are limited to 6 players. HSNCT does not have roster limits.

If bringing more players to nationals would hurt your ability to attend more tournaments this year or in the future (presumably for financial reasons), I wouldn't do it. If that's not a concern, I don't see any reason not to bring them. At NSC, players beyond a sixth couldn't play anyway due to the roster rule, but in general, I would say that it should be made clear to certain players that there is no guarantee that they will play a certain amount, or even at all.
Jonah Greenthal
National Academic Quiz Tournaments
User avatar
Important Bird Area
Forums Staff: Administrator
Posts: 6113
Joined: Thu Aug 28, 2003 3:33 pm
Location: San Francisco Bay Area
Contact:

Re: Bringing Everyone to Nationals

Post by Important Bird Area »

Also: this sort of thing is exactly why standby teams exist.
Jeff Hoppes
President, Northern California Quiz Bowl Alliance
former HSQB Chief Admin (2012-13)
VP for Communication and history subject editor, NAQT
Editor emeritus, ACF

"I wish to make some kind of joke about Jeff's love of birds, but I always fear he'll turn them on me Hitchcock-style." -Fred
User avatar
Sniper, No Sniping!
Tidus
Posts: 706
Joined: Fri Nov 26, 2010 12:25 pm
Location: Pickerington, OH

Re: Bringing Everyone to Nationals

Post by Sniper, No Sniping! »

I wonder if your coach may be onto the idea that perhaps some of the kids on your team that are either not good or don't really care about quiz bowl are probably trying to milk the idea of the team going to a national tournament as an excuse for a mini-vacation.
Thomas Moore
Lancaster Fisher Catholic HS c/o 2014
Ohio Wesleyan University c/o 2018
User avatar
Wbrandon
Lulu
Posts: 12
Joined: Fri Aug 30, 2013 7:59 pm
Location: Darien Connecticut.

Re: Bringing Everyone to Nationals

Post by Wbrandon »

Our coach has pretty much nothing to do with our team, so it is pretty much me, geolawyer man and a couple other people making the decisions.
Will Brandon

7th place MSNCT

Middlesex Middleschool 2013
Darien Highschool 2017
User avatar
Dirty Water
Lulu
Posts: 92
Joined: Mon Jun 18, 2012 8:48 pm
Location: Ridgewood, New Jersey

Re: Bringing Everyone to Nationals

Post by Dirty Water »

If, for some unfathomable reason, all players are required to play the same amount of games without regards to ability, then clearly there is an issue.
But if not, and rotations are reasonable, then why not?

More people=Bigger pool of money=Less money out of your pocket.

Also, bringing your less talented players to a national tournament may in fact be a positive influence for them. Often, people improve by watching those who are better; the more good people they see, the more they'll realize that they'll need to get better at quizbowl in order to be a positive factor on your team.
David Song

Princeton '21
Bergen County Academies '17
Ben Franklin MS, Ridgewood HS 2011-13
User avatar
Santa Claus
Rikku
Posts: 285
Joined: Fri Aug 23, 2013 10:58 pm

Re: Bringing Everyone to Nationals

Post by Santa Claus »

David makes a good point; the cost of nationals is no laughing matter. if you agree to let everyone go to nationals now and begin booking flights earlier, tickets will cost less and decrease the total cost of the trip substantially. Of course, deciding not to bring everyone right now would also save on air fare, but the idea is that bringing everyone would not impact you negatively and in fact, could be quite positive.

If you do decide to bring the 5-ppg and below people, make sure to emphasis the importance of improving. Tell them about how good of an experience it is to go to nationals; tell them to bring a notebook and keep a list of topics that come up for future reference. If you can successfully get them to be attentive during rounds that they are not participating in and willing to learn more quiz bowl, there should be no problem with letting them go.
Kevin Wang
Arcadia High School 2015
Amherst College 2019

2018 PACE NSC Champion
2019 PACE NSC Champion
User avatar
Sniper, No Sniping!
Tidus
Posts: 706
Joined: Fri Nov 26, 2010 12:25 pm
Location: Pickerington, OH

Re: Bringing Everyone to Nationals

Post by Sniper, No Sniping! »

Oh, this reminds me of what our team does for what it is worth. Everyone has to pay $300 (generally airfare + hotel room, more so airfare) out of our own pockets to go to nationals, however our A team only has to pay half of that since whatever money we have at the end of the year subsidizes those expenses for our best players. It works well.
Thomas Moore
Lancaster Fisher Catholic HS c/o 2014
Ohio Wesleyan University c/o 2018
User avatar
Sen. Estes Kefauver (D-TN)
Chairman of Anti-Music Mafia Committee
Posts: 5647
Joined: Wed Jul 26, 2006 11:46 pm

Re: Bringing Everyone to Nationals

Post by Sen. Estes Kefauver (D-TN) »

Apologies if I get this wrong, but it seems like your team is new to the whole national circuit thing. I am almost always a person who says that you should play your best 4 player combination at all times, BUT I make an exception for this one situation. If you are new to nationals, and you have no reasonable expectation of placing in the top half of the field, I think this is EXACTLY when you should bring along some alternates to give them a good idea what nationals is like. You can never know which of your players will end up being inspired by the experience and decide to improve a whole lot to try and make next year's nationals performance way stronger. If you have an A team that you actually think will be pretty competitive with top teams, then maybe don't use alternates there, but if you don't, I would say playing alternates on both of your teams here would be totally appropriate. There's always next year when you'll be a lot better to start playing 4-players per team at nationals.
Charlie Dees, North Kansas City HS '08
"I won't say more because I know some of you parse everything I say." - Jeremy Gibbs

"At one TJ tournament the neg prize was the Hampshire College ultimate frisbee team (nude) calender featuring one Evan Silberman. In retrospect that could have been a disaster." - Harry White
User avatar
Marble-faced Bristle Tyrant
Yuna
Posts: 853
Joined: Fri Feb 08, 2008 11:05 pm
Location: Evanston, IL

Re: Bringing Everyone to Nationals

Post by Marble-faced Bristle Tyrant »

Another thing to note when it comes to large roster sizes is that constantly switching out players can be really aggravating for score- and statkeepers.
Farrah Bilimoria
Formerly of Georgia Tech and Central High School (Macon)
User avatar
zachary_yan
Lulu
Posts: 76
Joined: Wed Mar 13, 2013 11:56 pm

Re: Bringing Everyone to Nationals

Post by zachary_yan »

Based my experiences with Wayzata HS, it seems like bringing * the max amount of people to nationals makes administration more inclined to give a quizbowl team money. Especially so if you can make it sound way more prestigious than it actually is.

*Edit: I think I meant "qualifying", or "having the potential to bring"
Last edited by zachary_yan on Sat Apr 12, 2014 6:05 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Wayzata '13
St. Olaf College
Wayzata middle schools assistant
User avatar
dtaylor4
Auron
Posts: 3733
Joined: Tue Nov 16, 2004 11:43 am

Re: Bringing Everyone to Nationals

Post by dtaylor4 »

Marble-faced Bristle Tyrant wrote:Another thing to note when it comes to large roster sizes is that constantly switching out players can be really aggravating for score- and statkeepers.
Yeah...coaches/teams do not care about this side effect. Trust me, I'm from Illinois (the state that has mastered the art of hockey-style line changes in quizbowl).
User avatar
Ndg
Rikku
Posts: 387
Joined: Tue Oct 30, 2012 3:24 pm
Location: Wisconsin

Re: Bringing Everyone to Nationals

Post by Ndg »

dtaylor4 wrote:
Marble-faced Bristle Tyrant wrote:Another thing to note when it comes to large roster sizes is that constantly switching out players can be really aggravating for score- and statkeepers.
Yeah...coaches/teams do not care about this side effect. Trust me, I'm from Illinois (the state that has mastered the art of hockey-style line changes in quizbowl).
Agreed. There is no obligation to make things less "aggravating" for staff as long as whatever you're doing is within the rules. Obviously, don't do it to deliberately annoy anyone (I can't imagine anyone doing that) but any team's primary concern at any time should be playing the best players to win or to give everyone playing experience or whatever your goal is for the tournament.
Andrew Nadig

Mannhiem Mannheim Manheim Township, 2005-11
Carnegie Mellon University, 2011-15
Locked