The Quizbowl Resource Center

This is the general announcement for the second annual VCU Spring High School Tournament. This is a high school academic quizbowl tournament to be hosted by Virginia Commonwealth University on Saturday, February 21 from 8:30 AM to 4:00 PM. The tournament is open to any high school team that wishes to attend.

The tournament will take place at the VCU campus, in Hibbs Hall. Please see viewtopic.php?p=117784#p117784 for directions and parking info.

AFFILIATION: This tournament will seek affiliation with the Partnership for Academic Competition Excellence and will be an opportunity to qualify for the National Scholastics Championship (pace-nsc.org), which is run by PACE and will occur at George Mason University in Fairfax, VA on May 23 & 24, 2009.

QUESTIONS: The questions will be provided by High School Academic Pyramid Questions (hsapq.com). The question format will be straightforward ACF; that is, games of 20 tossups with 30-point bonuses, untimed.

FORMAT: Described here: viewtopic.php?p=120148#p120148. Trophies will be awarded to the top two teams, and book prizes will be awarded to the top eight individual scorers.

REGISTRATION AND FEES:
-The fee structure is as follows:
Base fee: $70 per team. There is no limit to the number of teams who can attend from one school.
Buzzer discount: $5 off school's total fee for each fully functional system (control box and eight activators all work)—no limit to # of systems you can bring
Staff discount: $15 off school's total fee. This could be a coach, parent, student who is not playing, etc. Team-provided staffers will keep score for various games not involving the team with which they are affiliated. Volunteer staffers must stay through all the games (except finals) in order to receive credit for their school. There is no limit to the number of staffers you can bring.
Minimum fee: The minimum fee is $0 (you can bring enough buzzers and staffers to eliminate your entire fee via discounts, but you cannot have a "negative fee.")
-To register, e- mail me at [email protected] with the number of teams, buzzers, and staffers you want to bring, and an email address where you can be contacted with details. Feel free to share this announcement with any schools that you think would be interested in attending.

METHOD OF PAYMENT: To pay your registration fees for this tournament, please bring either cash, or a check (institutional or personal) made out to Andrew Alexander, who is the Quizbowl at VCU treasurer. Do not bring checks made out to Matt Weiner, to VCU, to "quizbowl," etc. We cannot use them. We strongly prefer not to deal with purchase orders, but if your school absolutely requires it, then you need to send us the paperwork no later than January 15 so that we can get it back in time for you to have a check written before the tournament. Contact me for details if you need to physically mail something to me or to Andrew.

DELINQUENT PAYMENT: Teams who do not pay on the morning of the tournament will be charged a $25 penalty and will have two weeks to pay their total amount before we start mailing letters to your school administration about it.

TEAM & ROSTER SIZE: There may be a maximum of six players on one team's roster, though only four may play at one time. There is a halftime substitution opportunity in each game. Each player may appear on only one team's roster throughout the day—no switching from the B team to the A team, etc. Teams may also play shorthanded with only three players. Teams consisting of fewer than three players may not play without my express prior permission.

FOOD: Neither breakfast nor lunch will be provided by the tournament. There are several eateries within walking distance of campus buildings and a vast cornucopia within a ten minutes' drive; maps and suggestions will be provided at the tournament.

Please e-mail me if you have any further questions. I'm looking forward to seeing a wide variety of teams from Virginia and surrounding states on February 21.

Matt Weiner
Tournament Director, VCU Spring High School Tournament
[email protected]

List of registered teams (updated 2/18):

Brentsville
Caesar Rodney
Detroit Catholic Central
Dorman A
Dorman B
Dorman C
Douglas Freeman
Georgetown Day A
Georgetown Day B
Gonzaga
James River
Jamestown
JR Tucker
Maggie Walker A
Maggie Walker B
Monticello
Rappahannock
Walter Johnson

Matt, all regionals will be done by February 7.

We can bring one team. I know i can scrounge up 4 kids to hop in the SUV for this. I'll confirm officially with an e-mail soon, hopefully.

Brentsville has often come in 3rd or 4th in the VHSL Region II. Patrick Henry -- I didn't know they had a team again (I'm assuming it's PH-Ashland.)

STPickrell wrote:Brentsville has often come in 3rd or 4th in the VHSL Region II. Patrick Henry -- I didn't know they had a team again (I'm assuming it's PH-Ashland.)

Roanoke, actually.

Rappahannock County is expressing interest for this. I'll talk to my team and see if we can go to this in order to warm up for VHSL states.

Hey, we have received confirmation on the location of this tournament; namely, Hibbs Hall. For those who have been to previous VCU tournaments, this is where the spring 2007 and spring 2008 high school tournaments, the 2008 summer opens, and the 2008 ACF Fall occurred; it is NOT the same building where the fall 2008 high school tournament occurred. Here is some info on how to find the building and park:

The entire tournament will take place in the Hibbs Building on our Monroe Park campus (aka "Academic Campus").
-The nominal address of the building is "900 Park Ave, Richmond VA" if you need to put something into your map software of choice, but be aware that Hibbs does not actually face the street, so you will have to park and then walk to the area where the building is in order to find it. I suggest printing out the appropriate campus maps and bringing them along--note that Hibbs is directly across from the Cabell Library, which will probably be easier for you to find if you have not been to the VCU campus before.
-On Saturdays, parking on the street is free and available in most places around the campus; the best place to park for access to Hibbs is on one of the residential streets such as Park Avenue, Floyd Avenue, or West Avenue that branch off Harrison Street to the west near the Hibbs/library area. If you cannot find a space in that area, then you should use the parking deck at Harrison and Broad, which is about three blocks north of the tournament building and will charge you somewhere between $0 and $5 to park all day on a Saturday.

We plan on bringing at least one team, though we will not be at full strength without Captain Tito.

Is this going to be the third or fourth ACF-style set for HSAPQ?

Also, Matt, on a somewhat related question, do you know what HSAPQ set will be used at RAQIT on March 28th? I'm hoping that it won't be the same one at this tournament as we would like to attend both (and Robinson purposely switched from using an NAQT set to another to attract teams in our situation).

Caesar Rodney HS wrote:Is this going to be the third or fourth ACF-style set for HSAPQ?

Also, Matt, on a somewhat related question, do you know what HSAPQ set will be used at RAQIT on March 28th? I'm hoping that it won't be the same one at this tournament as we would like to attend both (and Robinson purposely switched from using an NAQT set to another to attract teams in our situation).

I'd be HIGHLY surprised if the same set were being used in the same state like this.

According to the HSAPQ website, RAQIT is using 4Q-1, and VCU is using ACF-3.

Well, that answers my question. Thanks.

EDIT: Wait, no, that's the Robinson tournament from today. I mean the one that's going to be held on March 28th, RAQIT. That isn't listed on their site.

Caesar Rodney HS wrote:Well, that answers my question. Thanks.

EDIT: Wait, no, that's the Robinson tournament from today. I mean the one that's going to be held on March 28th, RAQIT. That isn't listed on their site.

RAQIT will use HSAPQ ACF-4, so teams are welcome (nay— encouraged) to attend both VCU Spring and RAQIT!

So it seems like ACF #3 had power marks, which is awesome. Please tell me this tournament is using them.

aestheteboy wrote:So it seems like ACF #3 had power marks, which is awesome. Please tell me this tournament is using them.

We haven't requested the power-marked version of the set; if a bunch of teams want it I suppose there's no reason not to, but no one seemed to mind the absence of power marks at the fall tournament.

I can speak for my kids when i say that we would certainly like to have them included.

Matt Weiner wrote:We haven't requested the power-marked version of the set; if a bunch of teams want it I suppose there's no reason not to, but no one seemed to mind the absence of power marks at the fall tournament.

Perhaps this would be better addressed elsewhere, but here's my question:

If the set has already been power-marked, wouldn't it be simpler to make just the one set with the marks and then allow the tournament to decide whether to apply them toward additional scoring?

When will the opening meeting be starting? Around 9am?

Also, this field is small but STACKED. It's going to be an interesting day...

Caesar Rodney HS wrote:When will the opening meeting be starting? Around 9am?

Also, this field is small but STACKED. It's going to be an interesting day...

I'd appreciate everyone being in Hibbs 403 by 8:30. We can process payment and rosters as each team comes in, and my opening meetings are generally about 5 minutes long, so if everyone arrives on time we can be into Round 1 by 8:45.

Matt, can you e-mail/PM me your phone number (or some contact number) so i can let you know if we're going to be late? I would be surprised if we were (we're usually one of the first teams to arrive at any competition), but we're looking at a 3½-hour drive with no traffic, and you never know on Saturdays. Thanks.

Oh, and much appreciation for starting this tournament as early as you are and committing to an efficient schedule so we can leave at a decent time. We're looking forward to a great day.

Caesar Rodney HS wrote:Matt, can you e-mail/PM me your phone number (or some contact number) so i can let you know if we're going to be late?

This information will be in the general update going out on Tuesday, as is my standard practice for VCU high school tournaments.

In order to make sure all rooms have excellent moderators, we will be capping the field at 18 teams, so anyone on the fence should make sure to register as soon as possible to be guaranteed one of the three remaining spots.

Matt Weiner wrote:In order to make sure all rooms have excellent moderators, we will be capping the field at 18 teams, so anyone on the fence should make sure to register as soon as possible to be guaranteed one of the three remaining spots.

Will you be needing moderator help? I would be happy to assist... in fact i even prefer moderating, really, than doing just about anything else while my kids are playing (including observing them). You can ask around, i can promise that i would be an asset.

We have you down as a moderator now.

Although I previously, at least in email, said Rapp wouldn't be able to come, if we, hypothetically of course, got a parent to drive three or four of us down there, then would this be accepted? We would then pay in cash...

pretzeldude92 wrote:Although I previously, at least in email, said Rapp wouldn't be able to come, if we, hypothetically of course, got a parent to drive three or four of us down there, then would this be accepted? We would then pay in cash...

Hypothetically, this would be fine with me, though hypothetically we now have 17 teams registered and Maggie Walker considering a C team, and 18 is the absolute maximum we can accomodate, so someone needs to e-mail me that they are certainly coming, and whoever does that first will get the last spot.

Rappahannock has now registered and the field is closed at 18 teams. If anyone wants to be waitlisted pending a cancellation, let me know.

What will be the tournament format now with 18 teams registered?

Caesar Rodney HS wrote:What will be the tournament format now with 18 teams registered?

It sounds like it will be three brackets of six with a 5-game round robin, then rebracketing, with the likely guarantee of 10 games plus any necessary top final.

If we look at what it says in the original post, it seems like the tournament would be 8 prelim games over 9 rounds, followed by 3 cross-over games and finals. In any case, I'm sure Matt will come up with something we would all enjoy.

aestheteboy wrote:If we look at what it says in the original post, it seems like the tournament would be 8 prelim games over 9 rounds, followed by 3 cross-over games and finals. In any case, I'm sure Matt will come up with something we would all enjoy.

Sorry, I didn't sound sure. What I meant was, I have seen the three brackets of six and I believe the plan is to do one round robin, then rebracket and do another round robin. Matt just hasn't updated the original post since he decided to do three brackets instead of two.

Tower Monarch wrote:Sorry, I didn't sound sure. What I meant was, I have seen the three brackets of six and I believe the plan is to do one round robin, then rebracket and do another round robin. Matt just hasn't updated the original post since he decided to do three brackets instead of two.

Yeah, this is right. Three brackets of 6; teams 1-2, 3-4, and 5-6 in each prelim bracket go into new playoff brackets. 10 games for each team. All ties for entrance into the top playoff bracket will be played off; weighted finals will occur; ties for entrance into the finals will be played off.

Also, in accordance with the majority vote of 2 people who wanted them and 1 who did not, powers will be used at this tournament.

Walter Johnson and Dorman A each went 4-1 in the playoff bracket; Walter Johnson won the final 410-300. Detroit Catholic Central was third. Georgetown Day A and Gonzaga tied for fourth, and Maggie Walker A rounded out the playoff bracket at sixth.

Full standings and results will be posted tonight. Thanks to all the teams and staff for coming.

Stats now up at http://www.hsquizbowl.org/vcuspring/vcu ... dings.html.

Wow. Finishing 11 rounds by 4:15? Thanks for running such a well run tournament and having such awesome moderators.

This tournament was really fun. It was very cool to be able to play 8 competitive games over 11 rounds. The questions were really good, and the few problems that I had with the previous HSAPQ sets seemed to have been addressed (for instance, the third parts of the bonuses were often moderately challenging). There were, of course, some very unfortunate tossups, but this set was overall my most favorite HSAPQ set so far. The one issue I noticed was bad distribution (both placement of tossups and the sub-distribution of answers within the packet). It's not such a big deal, but it also seems fairly easy to fix. The logistics were wonderful. All the moderators were good except one. 11 rounds by 4:15! In conclusion, more tournaments should aim to be like this one.

I completely agree. This tournament was the best I've ever been to. Despite the debacle in the lower bracket with Brentsville and Jamestown leaving, I had a lot of fun. We had two matches in the prelims which came down to the final tossup (against Caesar Rodney and Dorman C), so that was cool (even if we lost both).

Glad to hear that people liked the tournament. I want to publicly thank the non-VCU moderators who volunteered to make things run so smoothly: Dan Goff, George Berry, Cameron Orth, Andrew Feist, Andrew Chrzanowski, and most of all Steve Yang, who drove right to the tournament from Dulles after an all-night flight. Quizbowl Superhero status to that dude.

Congratulations to WJ for winning an incredibly intense playoff bracket, and to VCU for running an amazingly efficient tournament, getting eleven rounds done with a lunch break by 4:15 PM! (Somehow we got home at our usual time, despite 2 hours more driving - wow!) We got in some pretty solid competition this tournament, which was nerve-wracking and fun.

To put in my opinion, I was somewhat disappointed with the question quality - it seems like this set suffered from a lack of editing, which made it significantly less polished than the previous two HSAPQ sets. Repeats and overlaps were a significant problem, with bonus parts sometimes being clues later on. Certain tossup answers seemed oddly difficult for high school, and there were some selected answers whose tossups convinced me that a tossup on that answer can't ever be done well (leading to what some might call "HSAPCutie" giveaways to justify bad answers). I'm not against powers, and like them, but power didn't seem to be set at any particular level. While I can understand why HSAPQ does and should shoot for the easiest bonus part on a subject that they can, some bonuses ended up having "very easy", easy, and middle parts with no real hard part, and others had second parts and first parts that guaranteed a 20 for knowledge of either. Hopefully ACF-4 will have more rigorous editing, and I'd recommend doing the same for ACF-3 before it's used elsewhere.

What an awesome day. Almost certainly the BEST quizbowl tournament that i have ever attended. I'm so glad my kids could come and so glad i could be a part of it as well and help out. It was crazy fun.

I still can't believe how efficient everything was run, and i was even a part of it! This is ridiculous to get through 11 games by 4:15 with an hour break, and not even starting immediately when we wanted. Incredible.

Aside from being really proud of my kids who i think had some statement games today, this was just all-around an excellent competition and i enjoyed very much seeing some of the elites teams play.

I witnessed/moderated a couple of the most intense matches (and incredible comebacks) that i've ever seen before, once again supporting the oft-repeated claim that this is the MOST. COMPETITIVE. QUIZBOWL. YEAR. EVER. honestly without a doubt.

I too have some concerns with the set... there were MANY typos/grammar/spelling errors that were probably made in haste, not huge deals, but certainly make for some odd reading in questions. I also noticed, in bonus questions in particular, extremely easy clues being given over and over again, where they really didn't seem justified, for instance in the bonus about an author (which was the answer) giving no less than 3 of his novels including a one-line plot summary of his most famous one, including the title of that very famous one as well... all as the third part of a bonus. A little weird.

Largely though, i thought the questions were excellent and clearly the best HSAPQ set so far. If this is a sign of "improvement to come," so to speak, this is awesome, as they have already surpassed NAQT's quality by leaps and bounds, and soon it's going to be by miles and miles.

Also, it was good to finally meet/talk with some of the quizbowl higher-ups, including Matt of course. It was a pleasure to help out and believe me when i say, as i am speaking for the whole team who said this numerous times in our 3½-hour ride back to Delaware, that this was the best tournament we have ever been to. Nice job VCU.

I just wanted to echo what Mr. C said, and emphasize what a great tournament this was, and how glad CR was that we made the trip down to compete. It truly was a great day for us. Thanks to the staff at VCU for a job very well done.

It's "Caesar Rodney" by the way, in the stats. Rappahannock is just about as hard to spell as that... and you made TWO spelling mistakes in our name.

Eek.

EDIT: Also, Tommy's P/N ratio:
Trey's P/N ratio:

Caesar Rodney HS wrote:It's "Caesar Rodney" by the way, in the stats. Rappahannock is just about as hard to spell as that... and you made TWO spelling mistakes in our name.

Eek.

EDIT: Also, Tommy's P/N ratio:
Trey's P/N ratio:

The names of 3 of my 8 players are misspelled. They probably typed stuff in too quickly, or maybe could not read my handwriting.

Yeah, Tommy is a disciplined buzzer who hates to neg. His tendency to err on the side of accuracy over speed will cost him occasionally, but overall it serves him well.

The names of 3 of my 8 players are misspelled. They probably typed stuff in too quickly, or maybe could not read my handwriting.

Yeah, Tommy is a disciplined buzzer who hates to neg. His tendency to err on the side of accuracy over speed will cost him occasionally, but overall it serves him well.

On the other hand, I am not afraid to be aggressive and neg... which I do do a lot. I don't know if it serves me well though. I did well enough with 47.5ppg, which is typical for me, so I don't want to change my play style any and risk doing poorly, especially since I am okay with how i currently do. So I just maintain my aggressive play style, wondering if i could do better...

On the other hand, I am not afraid to be aggressive and neg... which I do do a lot. I don't know if it serves me well though. I did well enough with 47.5ppg, which is typical for me, so I don't want to change my play style any and risk doing poorly, especially since I am okay with how i currently do. So I just maintain aggressive my play play style, wondering if i could do better...

On that same note, I don't exactly have the power potential that Tommy does either...

ImaPC wrote:

The names of 3 of my 8 players are misspelled. They probably typed stuff in too quickly, or maybe could not read my handwriting.

Yeah, Tommy is a disciplined buzzer who hates to neg. His tendency to err on the side of accuracy over speed will cost him occasionally, but overall it serves him well.

On the other hand, I am not afraid to be aggressive and neg... which I do do a lot. I don't know if it serves me well though. I did well enough with 47.5ppg, which is typical for me, so I don't want to change my play style any and risk doing poorly, especially since I am okay with how i currently do. So I just maintain aggressive my play play style, wondering if i could do better...

I did not mean to sound like I was favoring one style over another. Everyone has their own playing style. Perhaps Tommy should be more aggressive. People must decide how to best play. Look at Daichi. He negs a bunch, and its hard to argue with his success. Chris Ray was well-known for his frequent negs, and he led his team (RM) to a national championship.

I did not mean to sound like I was favoring one style over another. Everyone has their own playing style. Perhaps Tommy should be more aggressive. People must decide how to best play. Look at Daichi. He negs a bunch, and its hard to argue with his success. Chris Ray was well-known for his frequent negs, and he led his team (RM) to a national championship.

No worries. I never took it to mean that you did. I just wanted to explain my style as well.