Predictions/Analysis for Nationals

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johntait1
Lulu
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Joined: Mon Jun 17, 2013 10:51 am

Predictions/Analysis for Nationals

Post by johntait1 »

Now that draws are posted, does anyone have any predictions or analysis for Nationals?
I'll post a bit about our two teams:
Varsity:We're seeded 14th going in, which I think is about right for us, since we beat the 15th seed AMSA 360-200 last year but we lost to Charter A(11th) and Ransom A(12th) by a pretty large margin before. Then again, I did say 9th last year might be a bit high for us(totally overestimated our competition I guess) so maybe my ideas for seeds are a bit off. We have managed get a lot more practice against good teams so that should be beneficial for us. Our team will be the JV team that finished second last year plus Ani, who was our 3rd scorer at PACE last year(but pretty much the same scoring as me). Ani provides around 30-40% of our current scoring because he's really good at the stuff I struggle with(non-history and certain aspects of history) so that should help a lot. We don't neg a lot since we aren't too aggressive so we probably won't play ourselves out of games, but that also means we probably won't be able to pull off any huge upsets.
JV: I was honestly pretty surprised that they weren't seeded since they are a lot better than my freshman team that got the 14th seed in the playoffs, but maybe the competition has gotten better in JV by a huge margin since then. They can consistently get questions on Nationals difficulty ahead of our varsity team so they have really deep knowledge. For example yesterday at practice they got several questions while Ani, Kai(top PACE scorer and our best quizbowl player), and I were playing. We've had a whole year to train them which is really nice since freshman year we started like February so we didn't do that well at Nationals. They have two really good players in Kevin Chen and Eric Wang. Kevin gets general history while Eric is more focused in US and Euro. They didn't do too well at State(maybe why they are unranked) but they were missing Eric who provides like 30-40% of the scoring. Also, TN states has been really hard on JV freshman teams(they are all freshmen) since freshman year our JV team went 1-3 with 400 points in the prelims at State but at Nationals prelims went 4-1 and lost by 10 points to the number 5 seeded team going in, and lost to the number 2 seed going in by 20 points. They landed in a hard bracket with Eastern Washington HS(didn't play them last year myself but I remember they scored the second most points after us in afternoon rounds), but maybe they can pull off an upset, since we were a much weaker team but only lost by 10 points to the fifth seeded team in freshman year. They do have a tendency to neg themselves out of games or get really good buzzes, so their finish may depend a lot on which version of their team shows up. They are also a bit packet dependent so the questions may play a big role as well.

Edit:On a side note, does anyone know if History Bee draws are posted yet? I'm leaving tomorrow morning and I still haven't found out who I'm playing History Bee on Sunday(hotel seems to lack free wifi)
Lo, Marathon Ham!
Wakka
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Joined: Tue Apr 02, 2013 11:09 pm

Re: Predictions/Analysis for Nationals

Post by Lo, Marathon Ham! »

johntait1 wrote:we lost to Charter A(11th) and Ransom A(12th) by a pretty large margin before.
If you think we've gotten any better since then, you're horribly mistaken. Our history bowl team is essentially our quiz bowl team and therefore Varun does the heavy history scoring while I back him up in humanities. Shrayus, Rohan, and Mabel round out the scoring with niche knowledge in other non-history quiz bowl areas. If a team is able to lock down Varun, that's game (which also explains our extremely bad finish at Mid-Atlantic Championships without him).

Our JV team is definitely under-seeded as our best JV player Jeremy Sontchi has been out most of the year and thus has not played with the team, but he returned just in time for nationals which should give them a boost. I think they'll be comparable to our freshman year team with Jeremy heavily resembling Varun from that point and Aditya playing a lot like I did back then (and carrying the humanities load).

Other predictions: From our region at least, I'd say Bethlehem and High Tech are the top teams to watch out for. I'm not really sure about the teams from other regions but I'd predict Saratoga to make another finals appearance and maybe Centennial from Maryland to meet them there. Regardless, it should shape up to be a fun weekend full of surprises and upsets no doubt.
Mohan Malhotra
The Independence School '12
Charter School of Wilmington '16
New York University '20
Wilmington, DE/New York City, NY
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jonpin
Auron
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Joined: Wed Feb 04, 2004 6:45 pm
Location: BCA NJ / WUSTL MO / Hackensack NJ

Re: Predictions/Analysis for Nationals

Post by jonpin »

johntait1 wrote:Edit:On a side note, does anyone know if History Bee draws are posted yet? I'm leaving tomorrow morning and I still haven't found out who I'm playing History Bee on Sunday(hotel seems to lack free wifi)
They have not been. The most recent email (which included the Bowl draws--which are currently being posted into the historybowl.com tournament tracker) said the Bee draw would be released late tonight or early tomorrow.
Jon Pinyan
Coach, Bergen County Academies (NJ); former player for BCA (2000-03) and WUSTL (2003-07)
HSQB forum mod, PACE member
Stat director for: NSC '13-'15, '17; ACF '14, '17, '19; NHBB '13-'15; NASAT '11

"A [...] wizard who controls the weather" - Jerry Vinokurov
Angry Babies in Love
Yuna
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Joined: Wed Dec 19, 2007 10:09 pm
Location: MD//DC

Re: Predictions/Analysis for Nationals

Post by Angry Babies in Love »

jonpin wrote:
johntait1 wrote:Edit:On a side note, does anyone know if History Bee draws are posted yet? I'm leaving tomorrow morning and I still haven't found out who I'm playing History Bee on Sunday(hotel seems to lack free wifi)
They have not been. The most recent email (which included the Bowl draws--which are currently being posted into the historybowl.com tournament tracker) said the Bee draw would be released late tonight or early tomorrow.
I can tell you the bee draw is completed (having just done it.) It will be up in the morning.
The lobby has free wifi.
Raynell Cooper
Arcadia ES '04
Richard Montgomery HS '11
George Washington University '15
University of Maryland, College Park '17
Hella things, National History Bee and Bowl
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