MSNCT Predictions (2021)

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Large Hadron Collider Jacob de la Gardie
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MSNCT Predictions (2021)

Post by Large Hadron Collider Jacob de la Gardie »

Seeing as this year MSNCT will indeed be happening soon, and MS IPNCT even sooner, I was wondering if anyone had thoughts/predictions on middle school teams/individuals for nationals.
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Re: MSNCT Predictions (2021)

Post by powerneg »

I think the Aatreyo-Tanay duo on Churchill is unstoppable, and both of them nearly broke the Hoppes-Minakowski Limit at the Suwanee Slugfest. The Abigail-Deven duo is also pretty good, but I've never seen them play together for an entire tournament, but you should watch out for team. Some "terminators" or one-man teams include Tate Osborne from Monrovia, Charles Heydt from Howard, and of course, Arin Parsa from Stanford Online. Arin Parsa is easily the best player in this field, and should win MS IPNCT. Kate from Greenhill is a good literature player and that entire Greenhill team should make it deep in MSNCT playoffs. Middlesex A is also a good team overall and shouldn't be counted out from winning MSNCT. Centennial Elementary, led by Satvik Jain, did get 9th at Suwanee Slugfest, beating the likes of Middlesex B and Churchill B, two well-rounded teams. All in all, I think the winner of MSNCT will be Churchill A, and the winner of MS IPNCT will be Arin Parsa, but quizbowl is a high-variance game, so you never know.
Last edited by powerneg on Mon Apr 19, 2021 9:11 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: MSNCT Predictions (2021)

Post by krbm17 »

probably a cold take but i predict msnct's top 3 teams in some order to be churchill, almaden scholars, and longfellow.

churchill: probably my tip to win it. they've proved their mettle on multiple hs sets, such as these. aatreyo bhattacharyya is one of the best middle schoolers in the country, with good generalism and great strength in fine arts and science. tanay bodducherla is a very, very good lit and myth-based player, and they're rounded out by strong support in lavanya gnanakumar and siya mishra. they also recently won suwanee slugfest, a tournament on an is-a set featuring numerous nationals contenders, including the two i'll detail below. however, this team (especially aatreyo) can sometimes go on rough negging runs which if they're not careful will hurt them.

almaden: arin parsa. arin is certainly the best middle schooler in the country. he's terrifying at history, and still really really good at everything else, as far as i'm aware. playing on sohs, arin's also done outstandingly well on numerous hs sets, even outscoring karan gurazada once! as crazy good as he is, he's just one person which in a competition like msnct will likely hurt him. that being said, he's got loads of experience at this level which will serve him well. i'll say he'll finish second at msnct.

longfellow: they're really good. deven hagen is one of the country's elite middle schoolers, with fantastic generalism and real strength in history. abigail lee is also quite good (at fine arts and literature i believe?), and that team is rounded out by great support from (i believe) ryan mckenzie and anthony zhao. i don't think they've played as many hs sets or fields as the above teams, but when they have they've done well, even hitting 20 ppb and over 5 p/g on dart despite not having a full a team the whole day, though admittedly against a middle school field. like aatreyo, deven is also a high-neg player, and that aggression could cause some upsets both good and bad. i'll say they'll finish third at msnct.

some other teams that are very good and you should probably watch out for: howard, burleigh manor, middlesex, greenhill, monrovia.
Last edited by krbm17 on Mon Apr 19, 2021 8:36 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: MSNCT Predictions (2021)

Post by curiousmind34 »

Churchill is probably the favorite but honestly people don’t realize how many times quiz bowl games come down to the last 2 tossups, so I’m not even going to say that they have the highest chance of winning, but that number is not even above 50%. As for the other two top teams they seem to be Longfellow and Stanford Online (Arin Parsa). If none of these three teams win, I would consider it atleast somewhat of an upset. Other teams to watch out for include Wisconsin Hills, Howard, Middlesex, Green Hill, and Bret Harte. These teams should be somewhere in the top 10. I think this year our predictions have a higher possibility of being accurate due to head-on-head matches between top 10 teams before nationals, but don’t be overconfident with predictions

viewtopic.php?p=357872#p357872 remember that not many put Hunter as their first choice, but they were on most lists in 2019. I remember going this tournament thinking that Churchill A would win, and thinking Hunter A might be around #5-8.

I think one of the teams mentioned in this post will win MSNCT, but I can really only predict that Churchill, Longfellow, and Stanford Online will be in the top 10 with any real level certainty, the rests are just “likely to end up somewhere around top 10”.That is somewhat the beauty of the sport, a couple favorable questions for the losing team can happen and all of a sudden the underdog can win the game.
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MSNCT Predictions (2021)

Post by gtag »

My takes

Churchill: As people mentioned previously, the favorite, and most well rounded team of the bunch. Aatreyo Bhattacharyya is absolutely lethal, and Tanay rounds Churchill out perfectly. My prediction is that Churchill wins.

Longfellow: Deven Hagen, a generalist, is the second best middle school player behind Arin, and he is rounded well by Abigail. Suwannee Slugfest could have been better for Longfellow, but I think that in such a stacked field, having to play teams like Churchill is hard. I predict Longfellow getting second place.

Stanford Online: Arin Parsa is the undisputed best middle school player in the country. The problem for him is that he has to solo. One bad packet can mean that he loses to a relatively low seeded team. Hot take, I think a bad packet will take him out earlier than people expect.

I think the final will be Longfellow v Churchill, with some relatively surprising team making top 4.
Last edited by gtag on Tue Apr 20, 2021 8:36 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: MSNCT Predictions (2021)

Post by matthewspatrick »

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Re: MSNCT Predictions (2021)

Post by Iago'sFriendly5thCousin »

I am going to divide teams that could potentially finish in the top 10 into three tiers based on performance on hs questions (various IS sets, various IS-A sets, DART, RAFT II, even IQBT "rookie" the regs set). Anyways, here are my tiers:

Tier 1:
Churchill A: Most likely the best ms team this year. Aatreyo is an op science player and Tanay is very good at lit and myth. Their supporting cast of Siya and Lavanya is good as well.

Almaden/Stanford Online: Arin is the best ms player in the country

Longfellow: Deven is a good hist player/generalist, Abigail is good at lit/fa, and their supporting cast is good as well (especially at RMPSS)

Tier 2:
Wisconsin Hills: Joshua Wang is probably the best ms science player in the country and I have yet to answer a single science question while playing against him (And I study math, physics, biology, chemistry, etc on khan academy and edx for 2+ hours a day), so hmu with whatever his parents put in his cereal :pleading_face:. His supporting cast of Jatin Gummadi (Hist/Ce I believe) and Saathvik Gowda is good as well, and they often combine for between 60 and 80 ppg alongside Joshua Wang.

Howard: We exist. Edit: Ok, will write more even though I dislike writing about my team I will probably get flamed for "depreflexing" at some point so here we go. I study all categories, but I have never touched RMPSS, Current Events, or pop culture (these are mostly things my teammates study). I have read like half of the fine arts 3-5 on quizdb at this point lol so I am getting decent at it; I am decent at lit; I am ok at physics and chem and good at biology and non-comp math. Our only real weak point is history... yeah we are pretty bad at history (none of my teammates study it and all hist clues ik are from osmosis so yeah).

Middlesex A: A very good, well balanced team; especially strong at humanities, but certainly not weak in STEM areas

Middlesex B: Middlesex A, but a year younger and slightly worse

Monrovia: Tate is good

Bret Harte: Impressive DART performance; consistent good performances on ms as well

Greenhill: Kate Ponnambalam is quite good, especially at literature; her supporting cast of Evans Senvalds (hist), Aaron Kuang, and Maya Jagsi is good as well

Burleigh Manor A: My only loss at MSNPT (DART); Claire Wang is a very good player (especially at lit and fa) and her supporting cast is helpful as well.

Burleigh Manor B: Very balanced team, did very well on DART (32 powers in 8 rounds). Consistently get high ppb and ppg.

Hunter A: Evan is a good hist player, and consistently gets over 100 ppg. His teammates, such as Ryan Lin, are quite good as well, certainly good enough to make them a possible top-10 team.

Harvest Park A: Shounak+Karthik duo at nationals would be pretty good, given that on separate teams, Karthik and Shounak both average over 100 ppg on ms. They did quite well together on DART, combining for 28 powers.

Edit: Forgot to add Herberger when I initially made this post but they are certainly a tier 2 team that has a shot at top-10. Omkar Bharath and JP Tate are quite good and Will McCollom is a good supporting player. They also got nearly 22 ppb on IS-195 in November (something my team failed to do in January).

Tier 2.5:
North Gwinnett: Quite a good team, at least on ms. The only thing keeping them from being tier 2 is their low power numbers at Suwanee Slugfest and not a bunch of very impressive hs data to back that up. Anyways, Jack Hunsaker seems to be a good player, consistently averaging around 60 ppg, and Srihith Singam is quite good as a supporting player, normally getting around 50 ppg (he has also seen massive improvement this year). We have probably played this team more than any other team this year and of the 6-7 times we have played them, they have beaten us once and came within 5 points another time, and often make the games close (The only time I can recall having blown them out was on IQBT "rookie", the regs set back in October, but they have improved significantly since then).

Tier 3: Teams that deserve recognition: Oak Valley, Heritage, John Adams, Challenger Strawberry Park, Westminster, Churchill C, Longfellow B, Columbia Independent, Colvin Run Elementary

Special shoutout to Centennial Lane, the best elementary school team in the country: They are quite a good team and managed to beat teams such as Churchill B and Middlesex B and came very close to beating my team. It is very impressive that they are performing at this level at such a young age, and one can't help but wonder how good they will be once they reach 8th grade.
Last edited by Iago'sFriendly5thCousin on Fri Apr 23, 2021 11:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: MSNCT Predictions (2021)

Post by powerneg »

Everyone here has given breakdowns or predictions of the same three teams, so I will dive deeper into other teams that should recieve a trophy from MSNCT.

Greenhill: Kate Ponnambalam from Greenhill is a solid literature player, and support from Maya Jagsi and Evans Senvalds, who cover science and history respectively will always help.

Burleigh Manor: Claire Wang from Burleigh is another solid literature player that is a force to be reckoned with, getting 2.25 Powers Per Game on DART, along with 90 Points Per Game.

Centennial Elementary: Led by 5th Grader Satvik Jain, Centennial Elementary got 9th in the Suwanee Slugfest III, with a Team 3.375 Powers Per Game on IS198A.

Middlesex A: Jamie Davis and Tristan Ebrahimi are a top literature and fine arts duo, and Rajiv Pujara and Felix Absolonne round out the geography and history.

Wisconsin Hills: Joshua Wang is probably the best science player in the country, racking up 32 powers in 9 games on IS198A. Jatin Gummadi and Saathvik Gowda are also very good players in their own right.
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Re: MSNCT Predictions (2021)

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Re: MSNCT Predictions (2021)

Post by romeokar »

I think everyone has similar top 3's or top 5's...

Here's my Top 10 non-A teams:

1. Burleigh Manor B
2. Churchill B
3. Middlesex B
4. Challenger-Strawberry Park B
5. Longfellow B
6. Meyzeek B
7. Churchill C
8. Greenhill B
9. T. H. Rogers B
10. Meyzeek C

What do you think?
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Re: MSNCT Predictions (2021)

Post by Hansen-MS »

powerneg wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 7:38 pm I think the Aatreyo-Tanay duo on Churchill is unstoppable, and both of them nearly broke the Hoppes-Minakowski Limit at the Suwanee Slugfest. The Abigail-Deven duo is also pretty good, but I've never seen them play together for an entire tournament, but you should watch out for team. Some "terminators" or one-man teams include Tate Osborne from Monrovia, Charles Heydt from Howard, and of course, Arin Parsa from Stanford Online. Arin Parsa is easily the best player in this field, and should win MS IPNCT. Kate from Greenhill is a good literature player and that entire Greenhill team should make it deep in MSNCT playoffs. Middlesex A is also a good team overall and shouldn't be counted out from winning MSNCT. Centennial Elementary, led by Satvik Jain, did get 9th at Suwanee Slugfest, beating the likes of Middlesex B and Churchill B, two well-rounded teams. All in all, I think the winner of MSNCT will be Churchill A, and the winner of MS IPNCT will be Arin Parsa, but quizbowl is a high-variance game, so you never know.
You should go to Vegas! :smile:
Last edited by Hansen-MS on Wed May 05, 2021 1:05 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: MSNCT Predictions (2021)

Post by powerneg »

Hansen-MS wrote: Wed May 05, 2021 1:03 am
powerneg wrote: Mon Apr 19, 2021 7:38 pm I think the Aatreyo-Tanay duo on Churchill is unstoppable, and both of them nearly broke the Hoppes-Minakowski Limit at the Suwanee Slugfest. The Abigail-Deven duo is also pretty good, but I've never seen them play together for an entire tournament, but you should watch out for team. Some "terminators" or one-man teams include Tate Osborne from Monrovia, Charles Heydt from Howard, and of course, Arin Parsa from Stanford Online. Arin Parsa is easily the best player in this field, and should win MS IPNCT. Kate from Greenhill is a good literature player and that entire Greenhill team should make it deep in MSNCT playoffs. Middlesex A is also a good team overall and shouldn't be counted out from winning MSNCT. Centennial Elementary, led by Satvik Jain, did get 9th at Suwanee Slugfest, beating the likes of Middlesex B and Churchill B, two well-rounded teams. All in all, I think the winner of MSNCT will be Churchill A, and the winner of MS IPNCT will be Arin Parsa, but quizbowl is a high-variance game, so you never know.
You should go to Vegas! :smile:
Vegas had no betting odds for quizbowl, they should add some soon!
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