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Terrapin @ MIT (3/2/19)

Posted: Wed Feb 06, 2019 12:18 pm
by naneekeralc
Hello, everyone! I am pleased to announce the MIT's mirror of Terrapin 30, which will take place on Saturday, March 2, 2019.

LOCATION AND SCHEDULE: The tournament will take place on MIT's campus in Cambridge, MA. Teams should report to room 34-101 (located in Building 34) in the morning for registration and opening announcements. We ask that teams arrive between 8:30 and 8:45 in the morning for registration; the opening meeting will start as soon as all teams have arrived, with games beginning immediately following the meeting's conclusion. A campus map can be found here.

GETTING TO MIT: MIT is easily accessible via the Boston T system by taking the Red Line to the Kendall/MIT stop. We recommend teams avoid driving if possible, as parking is very difficult to find on the MIT campus. A list of parking locations on campus can be found here. Please note that West Garage no longer exists.

Each team can have up to six players on its roster, but only four players may play at any one time. Schools planning to bring seven or more players should register a second team.

QUESTION SET: More information about Terrapin 30 can be found in the global announcement.

FEES: The registration fees for this tournament are as follows:

+$120: base fee per team
-$10: each volunteer staffer provided by a school.
-$5: each buzzer set provided by a school. In order to receive this discount, the buzzer system must have at least 8 fully functional buzzers.
-$10: for teams traveling in excess of 200 miles one-way, as determined by the distance Google Maps provides between MIT and your school.

The minimum fee for a school is $0.

PAYMENT: Teams may pay either in advance or on the day of the tournament. Either cash or check is acceptable; please make checks out to "MIT Quiz Bowl Team." If your school requires an invoice prior to payment, please let us know as soon as possible.

REGISTRATION: Teams will be accepted on a first-come, first-served basis. The field cap is initially 16 teams and will likely be increased as staff become available. Once the cap is filled, new teams will enter a waitlist and be added to the field if registered teams drop.

In order to register for this tournament, please email ALL of the following information to me at clkeenan [AT] mit [DOT] edu:
1. School name
2. Number of teams you are registering
3. The cell phone number of someone who will be traveling with the team.
4. The number of buzzers and staffers you are intending to bring.

Although expressions of interest in this forum are appreciated, the only official channel for registration is to email the above information to me. Registering teams should receive an email of confirmation within a day. You are not registered for this tournament until you receive an email from me indicating that you are.

Please feel free to contact me at clkeenan [AT] mit [DOT] edu if you have any questions or concerns about the tournament. We look forward to hosting your team for an exciting day of quizbowl!

Re: Terrapin @ MIT (3/2/19)

Posted: Mon Feb 18, 2019 1:29 pm
by naneekeralc
Field:
Amherst (1/0/1)
Brown (1/1/0)
Columbia (1/3/0)
Harvard (2/3/0)
House (1/0/many)
Williams (1/0/0)
Yale (1/2/1)

Re: Terrapin @ MIT (3/2/19)

Posted: Sun Feb 24, 2019 11:23 am
by naneekeralc
This tournament is less than a week away. Get your registrations in!

Re: Terrapin @ MIT (3/2/19)

Posted: Tue Feb 26, 2019 1:21 am
by Sen. Estes Kefauver (D-TN)
Hi, I missed Columbia practice tonight, and am just now discovering that apparently our B team has continued its historical bad habit of freaking out unnecessarily about homework and midterms and dropping out of a tournament that it REALLY should be playing if it wants to be serious about contending at D2 ICT and getting in the habit of keeping the Columbia program alive when we leave, and that other people on the A team don't want to drive to Boston to play in this field. I'm looking at the field and suspect that if we go through with our plan to instead attend Maryland, this site will no longer exist as a functioning tournament, which I'm dissatisfied by and am telling my teammate that I think it's not good karma for us, and that we should have figured this out at least a week earlier. Clare, will we be fucking you and your effort to keep the Boston circuit active royally if Columbia does this? Other teams like Yale, is there any compelling excuse for why you aren't also attending one of the staples of the invitational circuit, being mirrored in a major hub of the circuit?

Re: Terrapin @ MIT (3/2/19)

Posted: Tue Feb 26, 2019 1:35 am
by naneekeralc
So at this point I still have a couple of "maybe" teams who I am waiting to hear from. Ultimately I will go with what the registered teams want. My plan is to reevaluate the situation Wednesday or Thursday, see where we're at, and see if the teams registered at that point are still willing to play with the small field.

Re: Terrapin @ MIT (3/2/19)

Posted: Tue Feb 26, 2019 1:39 am
by Sen. Estes Kefauver (D-TN)
If you don't get any of your maybe teams and Columbia withdraws, what do you envision happening?

Re: Terrapin @ MIT (3/2/19)

Posted: Tue Feb 26, 2019 2:01 am
by naneekeralc
It will be entirely up to the remaining teams.

Re: Terrapin @ MIT (3/2/19)

Posted: Wed Feb 27, 2019 11:27 pm
by Simon de Montfort
Just to clarify the situation about our team, Columbia will in fact be attending the MIT site of Terrapin this Saturday. We've dropped out of the College Park site, and the MIT site will be the only site at which Columbia will be fielding a team.

Re: Terrapin @ MIT (3/2/19)

Posted: Sat Mar 02, 2019 4:07 pm
by naneekeralc
Stats through prelims are available here.

Re: Terrapin @ MIT (3/2/19)

Posted: Sat Mar 02, 2019 6:37 pm
by naneekeralc
Thanks to all the teams for playing! Yale defeated Columbia in a one game final to win the tournament, and Harvard A beat Amherst in a 3rd place game. Full stats can be found here.

Re: Terrapin @ MIT (3/2/19)

Posted: Sat Mar 02, 2019 10:55 pm
by wcheng
A private forum has been created for Terrapin, so please request access by clicking User Control Panel (under your username in the top right corner) => Usergroups => 2019 UMD Terrapin discussion.

Re: Terrapin @ MIT (3/2/19)

Posted: Mon Mar 04, 2019 2:28 pm
by Sen. Estes Kefauver (D-TN)
I'm delighted this tournament happened! MIT did good work and we got out at a sane hour, and I had fun. I am old enough to admit that my previous post's tone was too abrasive, especially taking an unnecessary swipe at my clubmates and other local teams in a moment of broader frustration. I've tried to put a better filter on when I post, and that internal mechanism failed me here, and I'm sorry.

BUT

I still think that I have a point deeper down if you strip away the layer that pinpoints specific players and teams. If quizbowl wants to be a game taken seriously and run in an adult fashion, it should absolutely be the norm to expect that adults should figure out whether they're going to attend a tournament 2 weeks in advance and should retain their commitment. I think it should also absolutely be the norm that, on top of Sectionals, Regionals, [Fall if age-appropriate,] and whatever national events your team gets a bid to, teams who are committed to the health of a circuit and aren't hosting events themselves need to try real hard to show up to regular-difficulty invitationals near them, at least once (but really, more than once) per semester. I also don't think it's ever OK to drop out at the last minute and switch to a "more competitive" field elsewhere, which was sort of what pushed me over the edge to make that bad post. MIT picked a date that shouldn't conflict with spring breaks, didn't have any other nearby invitationals the week before or after, and is in an easily accessible regional hub - thus, if the tournament had collapsed, I don't think it would have been their fault, but would be the collective fault of our region's circuit, and that would have been a real missed opportunity to keep the northeast thriving and a disrespectful waste of Clare's time and energy. I especially hope that players reading this who don't participate in tournament direction keep that last bit in mind as we move into the future.

So again, I'm delighted we all got it together and let MIT give us a really fun event!