The Quizbowl Resource Center

So, now that PACE and HSNCT are over and the new school year is about a month and a half away, maybe it's time to start thinking about next season. Just right off the bat, some Texas teams (in alphabetical order) to look out for next year:
NOTE: All stats from prelims
Cistercian Preparatory School (Irving, T-21 HSNCT, 20th at PACE)
Leading scorer Vimal Konduri returns next year (65.62 PPG HSNCT, 84.00 NSC), as does Ian Hunley (12.9 HSNCT) former B-teamers Mitchell Weldon (28.1 HSNCT, 14.00 NSC), Collin Nadarajah (28.0 HSNCT), and Jess Clay (12.1 HSNCT). The Cistercian B team made the playoffs last year. However, the Cistercian does lose James Yoder (25.4 HSNCT, 38.00 NSC), Andrew Skaras, and Alec Radford. Despite the regrouping going on, Cistercian will certainly be a major contender in Texas in the coming year.

Liberal Arts and Sciences Academy (Austin, 2 HSNCT, 3 NSC)
LASA, the state champions of last year, lose their entire A team from last year but do retain their entire B team which tied for 21st at HSNCT last year. Despite that loss and the youth of their B team, their B team did put up some very impressive results last year, and therefore LASA will still be a force to be reckoned with and a contender next year in Texas.

Paschal High School (Fort Worth)
In their first ever season, Paschal did well at last year's state championship and went 5-5 at HSNCT, just barely missing the playoffs. They emerged as a team to look out for, and they certainly have potential heading into next year.

St. Mark's School of Texas (Dallas, T-21 HSNCT)
St. Mark's tied for 21st at last year's HSNCT, but will lose leading scorer Max Genecov (50.70 HSNCT) and Shashank Mittal. However, second-leading scorer James Rowan (37.62 HSNCT) returns, so St. Mark's will also remain a major factor in Texas next year.

Seven Lakes High School (Katy, T-8 HSNCT, 14 NSC)
Seven Lakes did very well last year, tying for 8th at HSNCT. However, they lose senior and leading scorer Jiawei Li (84.14 HSNCT). However, Jiawei was not present at NSC and the team present there, which is essentially the team Seven Lakes will field next year, did finish 14th at NSC. Therefore, Seven Lakes is a very respectable team that will undoubtedly be another major contender in Texas next year.

Other teams that can do well next year include St. John's, Bellaire, and LASA B, among other good teams I probably forgot to name.

Next year will be something of a rebuilding year for Texas with the departure of last year's LASA A and Jiawei from Seven Lakes, but this leaves the field more open than it has been for a while. I'd say Seven Lakes is the best team going into next year followed by LASA and then Cistercian.

While I don't dispute the statistical analysis provided here by Vimal or Thomas, for that matter, I tend to think that the psychological transformation which must also be integral for one "A" team to successfully morp into another "A" team -- that process is more subtle and subject to disjunctive personality differences. In my own work wtih Cistercian, I anticipate a virtually seemless transmogrification. The manner in which we played coalition QB teams has meant that all my players feel comfortation with the other side of the team. I feel we'll be well situationed for the spring.

I understand that a QB Camp is being held currently at Texas A & M in College Station.
However, I haven't heard much about what's going on down there.
Perhaps a few posts would enlighten the faithful about how things are going: scrimmages, etc.
Good Luck, guys!

The students have really been enjoying the camp. They have told me that they have learned a lot from the guided practices, classes, and scrimmages. Most importantly, they've been having fun. Everybody's been making new friends and making good use of their pockets of free time. Although some of the younger kids (middle school age) have been slower to come out of their shell in both the social and quiz bowl components of the camp, everybody has learned some useful lessons about playing quiz bowl.

Yes, the feedback I received from QB camp held at TAMU contained many positive comments, esp. from our younger/new players. Now, if I could only figure out where we'll be competing during the month of September, my life would be a lot less stressful.

I've put in a bid to host Fall Novice in Austin again this year. I haven't heard back yet, but my target date is Sept. 10. As soon as I hear from them, I'll post announcements in the appropriate places if they accept our bid.

Cassian wrote:I've put in a bid to host Fall Novice in Austin again this year. I haven't heard back yet, but my target date is Sept. 10. As soon as I hear from them, I'll post announcements in the appropriate places if they accept our bid.

Thanks, Jason!
This date might actually work for us!

School Year has started -- Boo!
QB practices have started - Yeah!
Freshmen are doing great - double Yeah!

Cistercian Prep had a very long day of 18 hours on Saturday Sept. 17th as we motored down to Rice U. early in the morning to participate in the VCU Open Mirror being held there. Although we had a number of good matches, far too many questions in the packets were simply too difficult. When two good teams cannot answer lots of questions, you have a problem, in my opinion. Also, the question distribution was skewered way too much toward science/math to the detriment of other areas.
Perhaps this only reflects the perils of having high school students using college-level packets, but that just didn't seem to be the main problem to me.

All in all, though, we had a good time.

Thanks to Chris Romero.

And, a BIG THANKS to all of our alumni who showed up to support us and cheer us on: Nick, Erik, Larson, Phillip -- THANKS!

Catch the stats at, http://texasquizbowl.org/d/11MaggieMay/

I don't think VCU Open was too hard for a regular open event, the field that it's geared towards are teams who are really really strong. The stats for the other sites were more appropriate. It obviously was very difficult for this field, but that's the risk you run with mirroring hard tournaments. I also don't think they had too much science - they actually only had 17.5% of the questions be science, whereas the usual is 20%.

Remember-the-Alamo-Remember-Goliad wrote: Although we had a number of good matches, far too many questions in the packets were simply too difficult. When two good teams cannot answer lots of questions, you have a problem, in my opinion.

Collegiate open tournaments are considerably difficult, though as Charlie said, the VCU Open set was not terribly difficult for an open tournament. Regardless, even a good high school team such as yours might struggle with it.

Congratulations to Cistercian B who won the Texas Quiz Bowl Kickoff Classic on October 8th in Katy. A standings table for the Playoff teams is linked below.

http://www.texasquizbowl.org/d/@111008VK/index.html

Thanks, Chris.

Taking the #1 and #2 places in this tournament was just as much of a surprise for us as for anyone else! After the brutal VCU Mirror, we really had no idea how things were going to be in an I.S. set. There were just some results there which didn't make a whole lot of sense to me, but, hey, that happens, too. Grin and bear it, I guess.

And, thanks to you and all your staff for a well-run tournament!

Remember-the-Alamo-Remember-Goliad wrote:Thanks, Chris.

Taking the #1 and #2 places in this tournament was just as much of a surprise for us as for anyone else! After the brutal VCU Mirror, we really had no idea how things were going to be in an I.S. set. There were just some results there which didn't make a whole lot of sense to me, but, hey, that happens, too. Grin and bear it, I guess.

And, thanks to you and all your staff for a well-run tournament!

You definitely want people to know that a hard college tournament was too hard for high school teams to play. I'm sure all of the writers and editors of that tournament agree with you, for what it's worth.

Clicking on any of the links in the initial stat page seems to fail. Is anybody else getting this?

Angstrom wrote:Clicking on any of the links in the initial stat page seems to fail. Is anybody else getting this?

I think that is because the rest of the stats have yet to be posted. When they are, that will probably be fixed.

The stats files became corrupted when we transferred them. I constructed the stats you can see by hand (and calculator) from fragments of corrupted files so that we could post something. I expect to have full stats up by the end of the week.

Chandragupta Maurya wrote:

Angstrom wrote:Clicking on any of the links in the initial stat page seems to fail. Is anybody else getting this?

I think that is because the rest of the stats have yet to be posted. When they are, that will probably be fixed.

It appears full stats have been posted:
http://www.texasquizbowl.org/d/@111008V ... dings.html

Without the final, championship game being incorporated into these numbers, I'm not sure one would really call them 'complete stats'.

NHBB is currently getting in touch with a couple of schools in the San Antonio area who have expressed interest to see if we can get a C set tournament set up there. I think we have a quorum of schools to proceed at this point. We're looking at late Jan / early Feb dates for it.

The fields for the Bayou City Quiz Bowl Classic high school and middle school events have reached a total of 50 teams.
See the event fields here.

Congratulations to high-school champion St. John's B, beaten finalists Kinkaid A, and semifinalists Antonian and St. John's C.
http://www.texasquizbowl.org/d/@111119B ... dings.html

Hopefully, the stats for the NAQT Edmond Memorial Bulldog Tournament held on Nov. 19th will get posted soon.
Cistercian had a nice run of things, coming in both 1st for its "A" team and a tie for 3rd for its "B" team.
Many thanks to Greg Oppel and his staff for a well-run tournament.

Here are the results of the Edmond Memorial Bulldog Tournament run on IS-109 on Nov. 19, 2011

http://naqt.com/stats/tournament-teams. ... nt_id=3386

Perhaps your PPB from this event will suggest you're a bit underrated. Unfortunately, the power stats and such are difficult to use from a tournament where the vast majority of your competition seems utterly overmatched.

See you this weekend.

Remember-the-Alamo-Remember-Goliad wrote:Here are the results of the Edmond Memorial Bulldog Tournament run on IS-109 on Nov. 19, 2011

http://naqt.com/stats/tournament-teams. ... nt_id=3386

Having examined some of the stats at the HFT, one might equally make the observation that a tournament run for an elite few teams has the same relative weakness, but I don't see many posts being made about downgrading the value of those elite teams' accomplishments (or rankings) when they are playing weaker members of the field.

Whatever may be my reservations about systems that rank teams (all of which are imperfect), the fact that when one plays a team competitively, beats that team, and yet they come out ranked higher, well, that strikes me as having a bit of cognitive dissonance which needs correcting. Granted, some systems of ranking don't take win-loss as seriously as PPB or some other metric. But, when Cistercian's metrics are good on, for example, PPB, that should be accepted as it is. What is that old saying: What's good for the goose is good for the gander? And, no, I am not comparing apples and oranges.

In closing, I have no quarrel with the above-stated observation; it stands on its own merits. I would, however, simply like to see equanimity in its application to other schools.

Remember-the-Alamo-Remember-Goliad wrote:Whatever may be my reservations about systems that rank teams (all of which are imperfect), the fact that when one plays a team competitively, beats that team, and yet they come out ranked higher, well, that strikes me as having a bit of cognitive dissonance which needs correcting.

yeah, I don't think anyone thinks the rankings are perfect, but it is nice to have something to grumble about. This concept was miles away when I was in high school. These rankings are honestly about as useful as possible, and clearly a lot of work goes into them.

I can't believe I did this again. I worked backwards this time and stalled out at that darn undefeated team, Hawken.

Per Ashvin's rankings, Warren G. Harding is the 51st best team in the country. My undoubtedly manlier and more sophisticated rankings have WGH at 39, but we'll allow this for the purpose of the exercise.

#93 Olmsted Falls A lost to #51 Warren G. Harding at BRAVE Falcon
#98 Nitro A lost to #93 Olmsted Falls A at the University High School (WV) Invitational
#98 Nitro A lost to #426 George Washington A at the University High School (WV) Invitational
#426 George Washington A lost to #787 Charleston Catholic B at the Parkersburg Catholic Invitational
#787 Charleston Catholic B lost to #886 Parkersburg C at the Parkersburg Catholic Invitational
#886 Parkersburg C lost to #973 John Marshall B at the University High School (WV) Invitational
#973 John Marshall B lost to #1025 Brooke A at the Parkersburg Catholic Invitational
#1025 Brooke A lost 160-100 to #1148 St. Marys A at the Parkersburg Catholic Invitational
#1148 St. Marys A lost 150-140 to #1168 Williamstown B at the Parkersburg Catholic Invitational

Therefore, Williamstown B is a top 50 team.

Yeah, I don't think anyone really wants that, though I may underestimate Father Gregory's zeal. I see no point in arguing over the alleged imperfections of rankings that are vastly superior evaluations than anything I would offer in their place.

My only hope is to see the results of Edmond Memorial Bulldog incorpated into the rankings in a timely, fair, and judicious manner. Regarding my zeal, well, "Zeal for your house consumes me" Psalms 69 is the only zeal that comes to mind right now. But, off to work in the vineyard of our Abbey's prep school!

Have a great day & week-end

Congrats to Seven Lakes, which beat Cistercian in the first game of an advantaged final at the end of the double-elimination bracket at HoHoHo. St. Mark's finished third, with LASA's B team fourth.

Cistercian junior Vimal Konduri, Bellaire sophomore Ridge Liu, and St. Stephen's senior Shair Ahmed all hit 87 PPG.

http://texasquizbowl.org/d/@111203HoHoHo/

etchdulac wrote:Congrats to Seven Lakes, which beat Cistercian in the first game of an advantaged final at the end of the double-elimination bracket at HoHoHo. St. Mark's finished third, with LASA's B team fourth.

Cistercian junior Vimal Konduri, Bellaire sophomore Ridge Liu, and St. Stephen's senior Shair Ahmed all hit 87 PPG.

http://texasquizbowl.org/d/@111203HoHoHo/

What set was used?

HSAPQ 22

It may also be of interest to this readership that the Cistercian "A" team played with 3 members, not 4. Also, Vimal Konduri's individual stats ranked him # 1 with an 87.50 average. + Congratulations to all the teams who competed in this large tournament and, in a special way to all of the trophy winners.

Smuttynose Island wrote:

etchdulac wrote:Congrats to Seven Lakes, which beat Cistercian in the first game of an advantaged final at the end of the double-elimination bracket at HoHoHo. St. Mark's finished third, with LASA's B team fourth.

Cistercian junior Vimal Konduri, Bellaire sophomore Ridge Liu, and St. Stephen's senior Shair Ahmed all hit 87 PPG.

http://texasquizbowl.org/d/@111203HoHoHo/

What set was used?

First in this thread:

etchdulac wrote:Cistercian junior Vimal Konduri, Bellaire sophomore Ridge Liu, and St. Stephen's senior Shair Ahmed all hit 87 PPG.

In Rankings thread:

Remember-the-Alamo-Remember-Goliad wrote:Vimal Konduri (Cistercian "A") was tops in the individual stats with 87.55 PPG.

Later in this thread quoting the first time:

Remember-the-Alamo-Remember-Goliad wrote:It may also be of interest to this readership that the Cistercian "A" team played with 3 members, not 4. Also, Vimal Konduri's individual stats ranked him # 1 with an 87.50 average.

Is there a reason why this needed to be posted at least three times in addition to having the actual stats show it?

New rankings up: Cistercian moves from 35th to 24th

User was banned for three days for making many low-content posts based upon the quality of his team.

Congratulations to Cistercian on its undefeated run through the Winter Rodeo, including a 465-200 victory over a three-man Seven Lakes A squad in the tournament final.

Junior Vimal Konduri posted 103.33 points per game in leading Cistercian in its 10-0 run, which included only one match closer than 125 points: a 335-295 win over LASA 'Prune'.

Sophomore Carlo DeGuzman led finalist Seven Lakes A (9-1) with 83 PPG. SLHS was missing Daniel Chapman.

All four LASA teams reached the quarterfinals, with two reaching the semifinals. Their teams' similar names appears to have yielded some stat confusion.

St. Mark's (6-1) had won its six matches by an average of more than 500 points before a 380-160 quarterfinal loss to a LASA team.

Bellaire (6-2) reached the quarterfinals and lost only to Seven Lakes A and a LASA team.

WInter Rodeo stats

Addendum: This event was conducted on IS111.

Thanks for the kind words!

Just a coment or two and also a question:

1. Cisterican 'A' was missing its regular 4th player - Collin -- who had the flu along with 1/2 of the USA.
We were ably helped, however, by Lucas, who put points on the board for us throughout the tournament.

2. Having played Seven Lakes a month ago with only 3 players, I know the feeling they must have had.

3. One of our game wins was due to a FORFEIT -- I am not clear about how that affects our team's stats.
If anyone has knowledge of how that is scored/recorded, please let me know.

Special thanks to Rice U. and Chris Romero for a nicely run tournament.

Remember-the-Alamo-Remember-Goliad wrote: 3. One of our game wins was due to a FORFEIT -- I am not clear about how that affects our team's stats.
If anyone has knowledge of how that is scored/recorded, please let me know.

It is recorded as a win, but with zero questions heard in the "game" (so it does not have any impact at all on any of the rate stats).

Did LASA split teams at this?

Fred wrote:Did LASA split teams at this?

Though the composition of a LASA A team right now would be guesswork on my part, I would say that the four LASA teams present each had a theoretical A-team member on their roster.

To be fair, the composition of a LASA A team would be guesswork on my part at this point too.

Did LASA attend any college tournaments this academic year?

The St. Mark's School of Texas Invitational wrapped up late yesterday afternoon with Cistercian "A" coming out as the tournament winner. With a strong field of schools from LASA, Seven Lakes, St. Mark's, and a # of others, it was quite a day of competition.
I'm not aware of any official stats being posted yet, so all of this is from memory (weak memory). In a double elimination set of afternoon rounds, in the "semi-finals" it came down to Cistercian "A" vs. Seven Lakes (3-man team) with a fairly decisive win by Cistercian.
Then, in an advantaged final, Cistercian "A" needed a double win to take the title. In both of the final games, the lead moved back and forth, but Cistercian "A" managed to pull out a set of wins here against LASA to take the title.
Once again, without stats, I'm guessing that Vimal came out with top individual stats in the tournament.
Also, I'm guessing that Cistercian "A" had a P/B ratio at about 25 -- but that is a guesstimate.

Ian, Mitchell, and Collin did a great job along with Vimal.

Our "B" and "C" teams also did some nice work, too; sorry, but no stats.

Thanks to Paul Mlakar for running a VERY smooth tournament with virtually no protests and a nice field of 18 teams.

Do any of the St. Mark's people post here, or are we going to go without stats? Also, what packets were these games on?

St. Mark's used IS #113.

etchdulac wrote:Do any of the St. Mark's people post here, or are we going to go without stats? Also, what packets were these games on?

I think St. Mark's generally posts the stats to the NAQT website, at least.
If not, I have the scores of all of Cistercian's matches and may be able to post them if anybody would like me to and/or if it is necessary.
Unfortunately, those are the only stats I have.

The results for the St. Mark's event can now be found atop the texasquizbowl.org home page.