Sue Pasco Opening Tournament (9/24 at Essex Junction, VT)

[kcommo]

The annual Vermont-NEA Scholars' Bowl kickoff event, the Sue Pasco Opening Tournament, will be held Sept. 24 at Essex High School along with the league's annual coaches meeting. This fun, semi-competitive event serves as an introduction to the season for our local teams but we would be happy to accept teams from elsewhere assuming they haven't already played the set (NAQT-155A).

Entry is free for Vermont-NEA Scholars' Bowl members. Other schools are asked to pay $15 per team to help defray our question costs.

If you're planning to bring teams to compete, please email my at kcommo (at) scholarsbowl (dot) org as soon as possible. I'll need to know how many students you're bringing by Tuesday, September 20, but the sooner you can give me an approximate number, the easier the planning process will be.

I'm hoping to make the event a full tournament again this year, including matches during the meeting, but to do that, I'll need to recruit a number of volunteers to read matches and keep score. If you know of anyone who might be interested in helping -- teachers, parents, former players, or the like -- please invite them and let me know if they are willing to join us. I'll have to revise plans for the morning if we don't find enough readers, so I'm definitely looking to all of you for help. But whatever format we use, I will endeavor to have the tournament finished by about 3 p.m.

I also ask that, if you are bringing teams and your school has a buzzer system, that you please bring it. If we don't have enough buzzers, rooms will be forced to go without.

[kcommo]

Field (as of 9/21):

Burlington 3 teams
Essex 3 teams
South Burlingon 2 teams+
Lyndon 1 team
BFA-Fairfax 1 team
Hanover 1 team
Lamoille 1 team
North Country 1 team
Montpelier 1 team+
Cabot 0-1 team
Total 14-15 teams

[kcommo]

We ended up with a field of 12 teams from eight schools and Essex A won the title with a 9-1 record. Essex defeated Burlington A 365-315 in a battle of unbeatens in Round 8, and hung on to take the title despite a loss to Montpelier in Round 9.

Essex and Burlington should have qualified for HSNCT and NSC, while Montpelier, which was our top small school in fourth place, qualifies for SSNCT.

We don't keep individual stats for this tournament but scores are here: http://www.scholarsbowl.org/SPOT16_standings.html