Harvard Fall Tournament III (11/15/08) -- Cambridge, MA

[Melonman64]

If we will still be short on teams, State College has a number of alternates that may help for scab teams or something, though I suppose that's sort of almost last resort, since no one likes scab teams (though they can be interesting sometimes).

[jrbarry]

Andrew:

Please post the mundane details of how to get to Sever Hall, etc. We'll be travelling via the subway from the Residence Inn.

JR Barry

[ExcessStrausses]

This is probably the worst thing I could say after all those intense discussions of field size., but half of our A team can't come and none of our B or C teamers can step up (thanks mostly to my laziness and inability to communicate). As such, Stuyvesant will not be attending.

[Crazy Andy Watkins]

A post containing mundane details will follow shortly. For the moment:

Stuy has dropped from the tournament. This means that despite three teams stepping up over the past twelve hours to help us out, we'll still be short by one team. I have two things to say about this. First, while Aidan has explained to me the circumstances and I cannot blame him for not telling me sooner, I can certainly blame the people who didn't tell Aidan any sooner than they did that they were going to drop. If anyone else plans on dropping and just wasn't going to tell me until the day of the tournament, tell me now (and be three in number) or face my bleak sadness.

[Kyle]

I have misplaced my map showing Sever Hall's location, but I will try to make another one tomorrow. In the meantime, here are some directions:

Anyone coming via the T should take the Red Line to Harvard Square station. There are several possible exits you can come up, but all of them will put you in Harvard Square across Massachusetts Avenue from Harvard Yard. You need to cross Mass Ave and enter Harvard Yard. The Yard is divided into two parts, a western part called the "Old Yard" and an eastern part called the "New Yard." Sever is located right on the (eastern) New Yard. If you are standing directly between the very large church and the even larger library in the New Yard facing the church, then Sever Hall is on your right. It's a big red building with giant wooden doors and a lot of steps. I'm going to make a freshman from our team stand on the steps wearing the blue, pink, yellow, and purple hat that I won by being the third leading scorer at an MIT tournament in 2006 (second place got a broken toaster), so you can't miss it. My phone number, should you have any trouble, is (425) 233-5383.

Once you enter Sever Hall, you should head to Room 112 for registration. We will take your money, give you schedules, and tell you where to set up your buzzers. Your team can assemble in Room 113, which is a big auditorium. Included in your information packet at registration will be a list of restaurants in Harvard Square where you can get a quick lunch. You will have plenty of time for lunch, but please bring money as it will not be provided.

Registration will begin at 8:30; the tournament will start as soon after 9:00 as humanly possible.

Please note (hopefully Andy has sent this out by email) that in order to pahk your cah at Hahvahd, you need to pay $5 online (website above) and print out the daily parking pass in advance. I don't believe that you will be able to buy day-of parking permits.

[Crazy Andy Watkins]

If you're wondering to yourself whether or not to bring that extra alternate. this is the point where you say "yes, I am going to do that." The empty slot in the brackets will be occupied by a scab team consisting of alternates (or really whoever wants to compete and is enrolled in high school). So bring an alternate, and this can happen.

[Westwon]

If you'd like, I can give you the preliminary rounds sometime on Thursday, but I think our target was early Friday evening to have the set pretty much done.

You will receive them Thursday afternoon.

Auburn is still waiting for the questions.

[Crazy Andy Watkins]

We're aware.

[styxman]

We're aware.

Auburn does have the questions now. I don't really know why I'm posting this here, but woohoo. Looking forward to Saturday!

[rchschem]

Raleigh Charter has not received them.

Eric

[Crazy Andy Watkins]

Didn't know you wanted them tonight. I'll send off prelims now. As I explained to Georgia, our plan is to have playoffs done by eight, which is when Auburn requested them.

[Glacierguy1]

Kellenberg definitely has 5 full teams for tomorrrow.

[rchschem]

Didn't know you wanted them tonight. I'll send off prelims now. As I explained to Georgia, our plan is to have playoffs done by eight, which is when Auburn requested them.

There was an option for later than tonight?

I'll be copying in the morning and just wanted to have them in my hands so I could sleep peacefully. Thanks--got them now.

[Gunnells]

Georgia needs 7*-11* and the two finals packets for our National division. I also emailed Kyle.

[styxman]

We're aware.

Auburn does have the questions now. I don't really know why I'm posting this here, but woohoo. Looking forward to Saturday!

I suppose I should say, in the interest of not being the person who potential ruins a tournament -- I only know that Auburn has 1-6. It's entirely possible they also have 7 through whatever. It's entirely possible they don't. I don't know. :)

[Siverus Snape]

We have the regular difficulty playoff rounds right now, with the understanding that the harder playoff rounds will arrive in the morning.

[Crazy Andy Watkins]

Don't worry. Work in progress.

[Westwon]

Are we allowed to discuss the questions starting tonight, or are they going to be used at a later date somewhere else?

[Matt Weiner]

I don't know about future weeks, but the VCU mirror is a Sunday tournament happening tomorrow.

[Kyle]

I don't know about future weeks, but the VCU mirror is a Sunday tournament happening tomorrow.

You will be allowed to discuss the questions the second Matt reports the results from the VCU mirror on Sunday night.

Brief lunchtime results from the Harvard site — the top bracket will play a round-robin after lunch. It will consist of Hunter, Dunbar, Gonzaga, Brookwood, Whitman, and State College A, all of whom won their preliminary brackets with undefeated records. After moderating for one 510-0 victory by State College, I'm looking forward to being able to read these guys harder questions.

[Kyle]

Round One: Gonzaga big winners over Whitman, Brookwood over Dunbar, State College ekes out a victory over Hunter in a tiebreaker.

Round Two: Dunbar over Gonzaga, Hunter over Whitman, State College over Brookwood by about 500 points.

Round Three: Hunter over Gonzaga, Brookwood over Whitman, State College over Dunbar.

[Morraine Man]

State College (who are playing under the pseudonyms "Ted Gioia", "Andy Watkins", "Bruce Arthur", and "John Lesieutre') is undefeated and about to play Hunter in an advantaged final.

[cornfused]

State College (who are playing under the pseudonyms "Ted Gioia", "Andy Watkins", "Bruce Arthur", and "John Leisutre') is undefeated and about to play Hunter in an advantaged final.

Excellent. I hope "John Leisutre" is leading in scoring.

[Jeremy Gibbs Freesy Does It]

What?

[Carangoides ciliarius]

Very interested to see these stats when it's all finished, especially for Mt. Pleasant, the only other Delaware team besides us and Charter that actually does anything.

[ihavenoidea]

State College beats Hunter in the final 250 to 210.

[Crazy Andy Watkins]

This is just a public service announcement: do not do not do not discuss the set until Matt Weiner has released the results of his mirror which will be ending tomorrow night. Don't even talk in generalities about them (i.e. [subject] was really really hard; there were lots of stock clues) lest a team take the logical next step and study one subject or stock clues a lot.

HOWEVER please do email me about the set or the tournament itself, at andy.watkins2@gmail.com. Though there were some logistical snafus--the Six Feet Under bracket was unexpectedly saved by Simsbury B's car trouble, since that way we could resolve a team-goes-to-wrong-room,-plays-wrong-opponent error by using the tiebreaker round and stuff; the link for prepaid parking permits (curse you, Cambridge!) didn't work for one team and wasn't received by another--but on the whole, we gave teams an hour and a half for lunch and ran a twelve round tournament for which the finals started at 5:00pm, so I'm pretty happy. Major props to alternates from Brookwood B and Concord-Carlisle B for forming a scab team to fill in for Simsbury B in the playoffs; major props to Kyle for telling me to get a few hours of sleep before the tournament since I'd been up for roughly three days and finishing most everything by that morning; major props to our mirrors for dealing with our inexcusable inability to get them the questions on the exact date they requested them (though we did meet each final deadline!); major props to Brian, for running an impecccable stat room; our moderators, for reading; the students, for playing some great quizbowl, and the coaches, for bringing them here.

[Self-incompatibility in plants]

Although Caesar Rodney of course did not attend the tournament (it was simply to far for us to travel on our budget), I am very glad that everything ended up going well with the tournament after all of the... lets call them "complications". So congratulations to the Harvard organizers for pulling it all together against what seemed like almost insurmountable adversity, and for running what so far sounds like a well run tournament (an amazingly well tournament considering all of the challenges)! And yes, I too am looking forward to seeing the stats.

[Kyle]

State College is really good. So is Hunter, who lost to State College twice by a combined 40 points.

[Siverus Snape]

Okay, after seeing the scores from the Hunter/State College match, I feel much better about how the Illinois teams did with the toughest playoff questions. Kudos for a fantastically written set with only a few errors I noticed.

[aestheteboy]

Hey, did anyone videotape the finals?

[Crazy Andy Watkins]

I saw at least one person holding a phone very steadily, but I don't believe Kyle's plan actually turned out.

[rchschem]

We have the regular difficulty playoff rounds right now, with the understanding that the harder playoff rounds will arrive in the morning.

What does this mean? I got rounds 1-11; hopefully that's everything.

[Crazy Andy Watkins]

We have the regular difficulty playoff rounds right now, with the understanding that the harder playoff rounds will arrive in the morning.

What does this mean? I got rounds 1-11; hopefully that's everything.

Some of the mirror sites requested the extremely difficult playoff rounds (as mentioned up top, we produced a 7-11 of the same difficulty as 1-6 and a 7a-11a of much harder questions) for their top playoff bracket if they deemed it appropriate for their field.

[JackGlerum]

This thread is going to a horrible, horrible place.

edit: literally as I was writing this, it was split

[TheKingInYellow]

Are stats posted/going to be posted online?

[rchschem]

7a-11a of much harder questions

Wow.

[Jeremy Gibbs Freesy Does It]

Since I can't figure out what on earth your email is, I will jsut post here that it would be kind of nice to have some purely prelim stats, since as it is it's pretty bizarre to read.

[Crazy Andy Watkins]

Yeah, I'm kind of confused at the moment, actually; I don't control the SQBS, so I'm going to have to do this circuitously.

[Crazy Andy Watkins]

Yay, we worked this out. Brian took the time to recheck a total of ~195 scoresheets this morning, so props to him.

Prelims

Playoffs

[byoung]

Since I can't figure out what on earth your email is, I will jsut post here that it would be kind of nice to have some purely prelim stats, since as it is it's pretty bizarre to read.

Thanks for the heads-up; things should be fixed now. (If it still looks wrong, hit refresh in your browser.) Since I've only just now created an account here in order to post these stats, though, it's probably safest to reach me at byoung at fas dot harvard dot edu.

[Kyle]

Grail:

Round 2
Hunter 690, St. Andrew's 0
St. Andrew's: Timothy 0 0 0, Monica 0 0 0, Hannah 0 0 0, Douglas 0 0 0
Hunter: Lily 3 0 30, Tony 5 0 50, Guy 10 0 100, Maggie 2 0 20
Bonuses: St. Andrew's 0 0 0.00, Hunter 20 490 24.50

[Gonzagapuma1]

Grail:

Round 2
Hunter 690, St. Andrew's 0
St. Andrew's: Timothy 0 0 0, Monica 0 0 0, Hannah 0 0 0, Douglas 0 0 0
Hunter: Lily 3 0 30, Tony 5 0 50, Guy 10 0 100, Maggie 2 0 20
Bonuses: St. Andrew's 0 0 0.00, Hunter 20 490 24.50

Dude, a team grailing is really not that big a deal.

[Crazy Andy Watkins]

It also isn't the most polite thing in the world to call out, honestly.

[Crazy Andy Watkins]

Hey, we just heard about the VCU result (WJ over Gov A in the final) so it's safe to post the packets. They are here.

[Jeremy Gibbs Freesy Does It]

That link ain't makin the magic happen.

[Crazy Andy Watkins]

Curses, Chris Carter, I trusted you to include .com in your URL. I won't copy and paste so naively again!

[Kyle]

There is now a thread to discuss this tournament in the discussion section.

[BroNi]

Kudos for an excellent tournament! Questions, readers, logistics, starting and ending time, stats, lunch, ability to solve problems quickly (as in the 6 Feet Under mix-up), even down to the small details of having preprinted receipts. And did I mention questions? I thought the set was very balanced and fair, with a great answer variety. Bonuses had on average one hard part...just what we want to improve our teams and yet not discourage them. Nice nice job, well worth it. We've been to all 3 so far, this was the best - we'll be back!

BTW, which playoff rounds got the "harder" sets?

[Crazy Andy Watkins]

After reading the questions over the night before and seeing what we had wrought, we chose to give the top bracket only the hard questions. It seemed the sanest choice.