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VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Mon Dec 10, 2012 10:56 pm
by Blackboard Monitor Vimes
The Academic Competition Club at UVA will be hosting the Virginia NAQT State Championship on March 23, 2013 using NAQT IS-126, the designated state tournament set. We will not be using computational math tossups at this tournament, and the field is capped at 24 teams. All Virginia middle and high schools, public and private, are eligible for this tournament.
EDIT: I'm revising our field cap downwards to 21 and then instituting a waitlist, which I'll let in all at once if we get up to 24. EDIT: Sorry, I've realized 24 opens the potential for disaster for the previously stated reason for staying at 21: Because of the way they assigned rooms for this tournament, I've got to be very careful about scheduling (4 of the rooms are in a different building, and I only want to use them if I can self-contain a bracket in that building). I'm sorry if that inconveniences anyone, but if we end up at 22 or 23 teams it could be really deleterious to teams' experience, and I don't want to inflict that on anyone.

Location: This tournament will be held in New Cabell Hall, and we'll be meeting at 8:30 AM in New Cabell 319.

Parking: There is a decent-sized parking lot quite close to New Cabell. An address you can plug into a GPS that will get you close to this lot is 400 Brandon Avenue, Charlottesville, VA. That address is for the Elson Student Health Center, which will be on your left as you turn onto Brandon from Jefferson Park Avenue. Student Health also has a parking lot but threatens to tow without a UVA permit. The lot I suggest is past Student Health on Brandon Ave and will be on the right. Once you've parked, New Cabell Hall is the very large building across Jefferson Park Avenue. If you cross the street at JPA and Brandon, turn left and walk up the ramp or stairs to the side door of the building, which will put you on the first floor on the right side of the building. Both stairs and an elevator are accessible from this entrance.

If this mysterious lot makes you nervous, allow an extra 15 minutes to park at Scott Stadium and follow these walking directions to reach New Cabell: To get from Scott Stadium to New Cabell Hall, turn right as you exit the parking lot (this should put you walking in the direction of the stadium) and proceed down Alderman Road. When you reach McCormick Road, which will be the first traffic light you come to, turn right. At that intersection, Ohill Dining Hall will be on your left. Across McCormick Road from that dining hall is the Astronomy Building parking lot, which may have space available and is worth checking to save some walking time. From either of those lots, walk down McCormick Road in the direction away from the dining hall. You’ll pass Old Dorms and a lot of science and engineering buildings, some of which also have parking lots you’re welcome to try. When the road curves, keep going straight to enter Central Grounds. As you keep walking, you should pass the Amphitheater while crossing the Bryan Hall Bridge. As you exit the bridge, turn right to enter New Cabell Hall. You will be on the 4th floor.

This tournament will be a chance to qualify for both the NAQT HSNCT (top 15% of the field will qualify) and the PACE NSC (top 25% of the field will qualify).

Team size: There can be a maximum number of 6 players on each team’s roster, with substitutions possible at half-time and between games. If you wish to bring 7 or 8 players, we ask that you register a second team, and so on for anyone with larger numbers of players.

Food: There is a buffet-style dining hall near New Cabell Hall that will be open on this date. I’ll have a list of other food options available on the day of the tournament as well. We will not be providing breakfast or lunch for teams.

Fee structure:
Base fee: $70 per team
Buzzer discount: $5 for each system on which the control box and 8 buzzers work.
Staff discount: $10 for a parent, coach, non-playing student, etc. To qualify for the discount, volunteer staffers must stay through all games, not including finals.
Travel discount (200 miles or more, one way): $10
Minimum fee: $45

To register, please email me (Sarah Angelo) at sea2fj at virginia dot edu. Checks should be made out to “Academic Competition Club,” though we can also accept cash. Please pay either in advance or, preferably, on the day of the tournament. If you wish to pay in advance, please indicate this in your registration and I will send you an address. Likewise, please let me know if you will need an invoice and/or a W-9.

We hope to see you all in March!

Field (21):

Bassett
Blacksburg (3)
Clover Hill (2)
Cosby
Douglas Freeman
Eastern View
Hanover
Hidden Valley (2)
Loudoun County
Maggie Walker (2)
Rappahannock
Thomas Jefferson (2)
Wakefield (2)
Western Albemarle

Waitlist:

Cave Spring
Clover Hill C

Buzzers (15):

Bassett (2)
Blacksburg (2)
Clover Hill
Douglas Freeman
Hidden Valley
Loudoun County
Rappahannock
Thomas Jefferson (3)
Wakefield (2)
Western Albemarle

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Mon Dec 10, 2012 11:01 pm
by Important Bird Area
The Laughing Cavalier wrote:using NAQT IS-12[whatever the states set is this year; I'll check on that at a later date]
IS #126.

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Mon Dec 10, 2012 11:17 pm
by Blackboard Monitor Vimes
bt_green_warbler wrote:
The Laughing Cavalier wrote:using NAQT IS-12[whatever the states set is this year; I'll check on that at a later date]
IS #126.
Thanks, Jeff!

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Mon Jan 07, 2013 4:37 pm
by Blackboard Monitor Vimes
We now have 2 teams registered! I filled out the room request form a week ago when it opened up; I'll send out an invitation email either when I hear back about room reservations or on 1/15, whichever comes first.

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Mon Jan 21, 2013 2:30 pm
by Blackboard Monitor Vimes
The Laughing Cavalier wrote:We now have 2 teams registered! I filled out the room request form a week ago when it opened up; I'll send out an invitation email either when I hear back about room reservations or on 1/15, whichever comes first.
I realize I'm running a little late on this; I haven't had a good opportunity to make sure my contact info is current. My new plan is to send out the invite email when I get home from work tonight. We do have rooms reserved and the field cap of 24 listed in the first post is accurate. Thanks!

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Sat Jan 26, 2013 3:13 pm
by Ye Olde Buzzard
Please send an invitation to Sherando High School.

The link has snail mail contact on the banner at the bottom of the page, and email for both coaches.

Our kids have been working very hard on protobowl, studying packets, etc., but the teachers need a little bit of a more forward approach for them to go any further with the program than VHSL. They did attend a local tournament at Woodgrove HS. I think it was the only invitation to a tournament that their school has EVER received. Snail mail might work better, if that's an option.

http://shs.frederick.k12.va.us/pages/Sh ... demic_Team

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Wed Feb 20, 2013 11:56 am
by Blackboard Monitor Vimes
We are now platinum-certified by PACE, so the top 25% of teams from this event will qualify for the 2013 NSC. With a little over a month to go, we still have plenty of room in the field.

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Thu Feb 28, 2013 2:24 pm
by Blackboard Monitor Vimes
We're now at 13 teams. I'm planning to send another email out this weekend reminding teams to register and explaining what's up with our field cap, but to put it briefly, our room reservation situation is less than great (we have enough rooms for 24 teams, but one bracket would have to be in a different building), so I'm dropping the cap to 18 and waitlisting up to 24 lest an unfortunate number of teams make scheduling this tournament without running between buildings impossible. When I've got a little more free time this weekend I'll consider the numbers in more detail and see if I can create a fair schedule in one building for a larger number, but I know 18 would be safe. I hope this doesn't inconvenience anyone; we'd love to accomodate as many teams as possible but I also don't want to cause teams to have a bad time because of an ugly schedule.

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Thu Feb 28, 2013 3:05 pm
by Blackboard Monitor Vimes
The Laughing Cavalier wrote:We're now at 13 teams. I'm planning to send another email out this weekend reminding teams to register and explaining what's up with our field cap, but to put it briefly, our room reservation situation is less than great (we have enough rooms for 24 teams, but one bracket would have to be in a different building), so I'm dropping the cap to 18 and waitlisting up to 24 lest an unfortunate number of teams make scheduling this tournament without running between buildings impossible. When I've got a little more free time this weekend I'll consider the numbers in more detail and see if I can create a fair schedule in one building for a larger number, but I know 18 would be safe. I hope this doesn't inconvenience anyone; we'd love to accomodate as many teams as possible but I also don't want to cause teams to have a bad time because of an ugly schedule.
Thanks to George Berry for saving me from having to stare at numbers after my midterm by pointing out that I can run 21 teams in one building just fine, so I'll scale up to that with the same note that we can move to 24 if I get three waitlisted teams.

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Mon Mar 04, 2013 12:11 pm
by Blackboard Monitor Vimes
In accordance with New Cabell Hall's ongoing efforts to give me an ulcer, I've been notified that two of our rooms have been cancelled from my reservation due to construction that will be taking place inside them on this date. I can keep the field structure the same as previously announced, with the only difference being that we now definitely have to self-contain a bracket in Maury Hall. Teams won't be moving between buildings at all except when we re-bracket over lunch, so hopefully all of the potential complications will only affect staff. Nevertheless I am sorry for any inconvenience this may cause, but I'm glad at least that the reservation has changed in such a way that I don't have to drop our field cap.

As far as NASAT tryouts go, I am willing to run these if there is sufficient interest, but I am still looking for someone interested in coaching Team Virginia, as I'll be in class and cannot escort a team to the tournament. This coach would not necessarily need to attend NAQT States, as I can handle the tryout for them if need be, and can be just about any adult: parents, older siblings, coaches of individual high school teams, and college students are all fine, for example. Please let me know if you're interested.

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Tue Mar 12, 2013 9:46 pm
by Longstride
How would NASAT tryouts be conducted?

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Tue Mar 12, 2013 10:09 pm
by Blackboard Monitor Vimes
Longstride wrote:How would NASAT tryouts be conducted?
So far I've had one person interested, so I honestly haven't really worried about it yet. If they turn out to be necessary, they'll be on a college set from this year; format will depend entirely on the number of signups. I'm planning to send out a teams/buzzers/staff confirmation email to coaches either tonight or tomorrow; I'll ask about interest in NASAT tryouts again and then ask around to editors about using a set if there's sufficient interest.

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Wed Mar 13, 2013 8:03 am
by Longstride
OK, well I'd definitely be interested in NASAT tryouts. Would it just be straight playing a packet and top point-totals would qualify, or would there be an attempt to "balance" a potential NASAT team by subjects?

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Wed Mar 13, 2013 10:43 am
by Blackboard Monitor Vimes
Longstride wrote:OK, well I'd definitely be interested in NASAT tryouts. Would it just be straight playing a packet and top point-totals would qualify, or would there be an attempt to "balance" a potential NASAT team by subjects?
The latter, most likely. Like I said, though, it's really impossible to determine until I have a number of students interested (6 or fewer can just be the team, and while I'd rather not just plop 7 or 8 in a room and keep score, that could be a possibility). Daniel's method last year of keeping track of subject buzzes with no more than 4 people playing in a room at a time seemed sound.

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Sun Mar 17, 2013 8:41 pm
by Blackboard Monitor Vimes
I've come to the realization that expanding to 24 could cause us exactly the problem I was trying to prevent by keeping the initial cap at 21 (i.e. if anyone drops, we could end up with a number that is impossible for me to schedule given our room configuration). With apologies, we're going to stay at 21; I'd love to be able to accomodate more teams, but I don't want to risk this unintentionally turning into a terrible experience for the teams we do have.

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Thu Mar 21, 2013 12:27 pm
by Blackboard Monitor Vimes
There's still not enough interest for NASAT tryouts to be necessary, but if they are, we'll be using Penn-ance. Thanks, Eric!

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Sat Mar 23, 2013 1:18 pm
by Blackboard Monitor Vimes
Prelim Stats

Only 4 players were interested in trying out for NASAT, so Team Virginia is currently Sachith from Hidden Valley, Eric from Western Ablemarle, Venu from Clover Hill, and Mason from Loudoun County.

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Sat Mar 23, 2013 2:23 pm
by jonathanmarx
The Laughing Cavalier wrote:
Only 4 players were interested in trying out for NASAT, so Team Virginia is currently Sachith from Hidden Valley, Eric from Western Ablemarle, Venu from Clover Hill, and Mason from Loudoun County.
No Raynor or anyone from Gov?!?!?

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Sat Mar 23, 2013 3:22 pm
by Blackboard Monitor Vimes
jonathanmarx wrote:
The Laughing Cavalier wrote:
Only 4 players were interested in trying out for NASAT, so Team Virginia is currently Sachith from Hidden Valley, Eric from Western Ablemarle, Venu from Clover Hill, and Mason from Loudoun County.
No Raynor or anyone from Gov?!?!?
Apparently none of them are able to go to/interested in playing NASAT.

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Sat Mar 23, 2013 5:16 pm
by Blackboard Monitor Vimes
Western Albemarle cleared the field to win the tournament, and TJ B defeated Maggie Walker A in the second place tiebreaker.

Playoff stats are online. Western Albemarle, TJ B, Maggie Walker A, TJ A, and Wakefield A have qualified for the HSNCT, as has our highest finishing small school, but I need to confirm who that is. Those five teams have also qualified for the NSC, as has Loudoun County.

Thanks for coming, everyone!

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Sat Mar 23, 2013 7:34 pm
by Blackboard Monitor Vimes
Thanks also to my teammates and to our outside staffers, George Berry, Brian Mongilio, Cody Voight, Matt Weiner, and Mr. Beeken of Blacksburg. We couldn't have done it without you!

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Sat Mar 23, 2013 8:03 pm
by UlyssesInvictus
Thanks to UVA and VCU for running a very smooth tournament that proceeded without a glitch despite having to run the tournament in two different buildings.

Congrats to Western Albemarle for clearing the field; Eric is looking more and more fearsome by the tournament. And congrats to our B team for continuing a tradition of upsetting the A team at NAQT states; me from 2 years ago is very proud.

Re: VA NAQT States at UVA (3/23/13 in Charlottesville)

Posted: Sat Mar 23, 2013 8:21 pm
by Kafkaesque
I'll echo everything that Raynor said; it was a superbly well-run tournament. Thanks for a great time!