NJ/NY 2013-2014

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NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Insolvency law of Canada »

Given that HSNCT and PACE are now done, I think that we can start making guesses about what the scene's going to look like next year:

St. Joe's: had a disappointing - and one suspects rather anomalous - performance at HSNCT this year, but looked untouchable at times in the local scene. Ploch and Dan graduate; Ploch's departure will hurt their science performance significantly. Despite this, Jack will return for his senior year after having already been recognized as the best player in New Jersey. They should be stronger than ever.

High Tech:had two teams tie for 33rd at HSNCT, and a fifteenth place finish at PACE. High Tech will graduate the entirety of the A team except for me, but has a deep pool of players to draw on - the A,B, and C teams will be consolidated into one team. We should increase in strength, and will probably compete with St. Joe's for the best in the state.

Ridgewood: had a disappointing HSNCT result, but made up for it by taking 17th at PACE. They were a very strong contender throughout the year, but are graduating both Kara and Powers, leaving Esther and Ben as the veteran members. They do, have a deep pool of players to draw from, but replacing the seniors will be difficult.

Mountain Lakes: tied for 50th place at HSNCT and were consistently strong throughout the year. However, both PJ and Hamza are graduating and I am unaware of who they have waiting to fill their spots. Does anyone have any more information?

Ranney: loses an extremely strong player in Roey, and does not have anyone who appears able to succeed him. Ranney should decrease significantly in playing strength next year.

Irvington: loses their strongest player, Alec, and it is difficult to see who replaces him. Expect them to be much weaker next year.

Kellenberg: had a disappointing HSNCT, but was strong throughout the year. They should improve as Joe, already a top player, returns for his Junior year.

Hunter: tied for 50th at HSNCT, and took 13th at PACE. A perennial powerhouse, they graduate their entire A team except for Marianna. It may be a rebuilding year for Hunter, as their B team at PACE was comprised almost entirely of sophomores, but they are, of course, Hunter. They should remain one of the top teams in the area, if perhaps not as good as this season's team.

Charter: is not technically a NJ/NY school, but goes to enough tournaments to be listed here. They tied for 50th at HSNCT, and were very good when they had their entire A team together this year. However, a lot of their players are graduating, leaving the burden to their B team, which went 5-5 in the prelims of HSNCT. Next year will probably be a building year, but they have the potential to be very strong.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Banana Stand »

Bergen loses Boris but retains Ahbiram so they should be able to hold their own next year.

Seton Hall Prep and Millburn lose JP and Andrew Brod respectively, which are significant losses to both teams.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by ProfessorIanDuncan »

I am curious as to how many players Livingston is returning. They put up good bonus conversion numbers and held their own against some good teams. West WIndsor Plainsboro should also be strong next year; I think that most of their players are juniors and this is a team that beat Irvington and Ridgewood at NJ States. If Horace Greeley starts attending tournaments expect them to put up numbers; their top two players return this year and they always have a lot of talent to draw from. Stuyvesant will also be an interesting team to watch. Bernard is leaving, along with a couple others, but they have plenty of talent including Alex who has been able to put up spectaular numbers. Their main issue will be getting to tournaments. North Babylon shouldn't be counted out either. They lose Brian but retain Max, John, and Emmanuel who could make them a potential threat. Max is capable of some seriously impressive buzzes and converting some tough bonuses (read: he did really well at NASAT tryouts) and that could make the difference in many games.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Northern Central Railway »

Hurrah!Praga! wrote:
Mountain Lakes: tied for 50th place at HSNCT and were consistently strong throughout the year. However, both PJ and Hamza are graduating and I am unaware of who they have waiting to fill their spots. Does anyone have any more information?
Mark (a sophomore) and Michael (a junior) will return from the team that went to HSNCT. Hamza and PJ went from a combined 27 PPG at HSNCT '12 to 67 PPG at HSNCT '13; what progress Mark and Michael will make from their combined 26 PPG at HSNCT '13 remains to be seen, as we have some very large knowledge gaps to fill. There's also a slight chance that Mountain Lakes will meet NAQT's definition of a small school next year (we were 24 students away this year).

Our success on The Challenge has led to exponential growth in the number of people interested in quizbowl - there were 5 on the team in 2011-12 and if current interest holds there will be 20+ in 2013-14 (13 of which are 8th graders that will be freshmen next year), which should help make things more competitive within the team.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by czheng0708 »

This circuit should be really interesting to watch next year. I'm kind of excited, even though I'm pretty sure my team won't be able to replicate any past successes
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Guybo »

Livingston returns 2 (Chris and David) from its A team. They totaled 55 ppg together at HSNCT and improved a lot throughout the year. I have no clue how much they'll improve over the summer nor who will join them on next year's A team but our B team wasn't overly competitive this year, though with kids with some good knowledge and ability there as well as some sophomores with potential on the C team. Perhaps some players will step up their games but there will be a big gap in knowledge losing Alex (science, et al.) and Mayer (Arts, et al.) and, as we don't practice all that much, it's hard to say how much we'll improve as an A team. Time will tell. Have a good summer, everyone!
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Insolvency law of Canada »

Oops, looks like I missed a few more schools than I thought I did.

St. Joe's and High Tech look to be the front runners going into next year, with Hunter, Charter, Ridgewood, and Kellenberg right behind. Mountain Lakes, Livingston, GNS, North Babylon, and Stuyvesant have potential; how much develops will depend a great deal on how much they study.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Al Hirt »

czheng0708 wrote:This circuit should be really interesting to watch next year. I'm kind of excited, even though I'm pretty sure my team won't be able to replicate any past successes
Same with my team. East Brunswick managed to qualify for nationals after putting together a decent run at BATE, but had a rather off year otherwise (and obviously we didn't go). Regardless, this is a rebuilding year for us(at least to start), but we hope we can get back to our previous heights soon.
If David from Livingston played on B at Bloomfield, I remember him having ridiculous buzzer speed and knowledge depth of certain questions. Ridgewood has the ability to completely knock a team off its game and Joe from Kellenberg is definitely looked like he was having a lot of fun doing what he did. I can't point out any of the Mountain Lakes players from my limited experience, but they were definitely a force to be reckoned with. The only chance I had to play High Tech was at MonDon's Jeopardy style tournament, but obviously they were dominant there as well. Hopefully, both myself and my school will be able to go to more tournaments in the area this season.
Did Reuben from MAST graduate? I was somewhat surprised not to see MAST on here, but Reuben graduating could explain that.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by jonpin »

Bergen had somewhat of a down year, but I was reasonably satisfied with our performance at PACE. As was said above, Boris is our only graduate from the A team, and Abhiram et al. will now be seniors. If I can keep them motivated, our sophomores grow and mature, and we can make good use of David Song, we could contend in some local tournaments this coming season.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Steak and Kidney Pie »

I should probably give an update on Ithaca, at least so people actually recognize the existence of areas of New York that are signifcantly outside of the metro area. We had some stupid losses at HSNCT, and missed playoffs when we really shouldn't have. (Evident from the scores of our games and consolation tournament results). Our primary loss is me, which honestly doesn't matter too much, because HSNCT has a very large amount of history and geography, which are categories I'm relatively weak in. (Decent in some areas of history, horrible at geography). I will be replaced with rising freshman Casey Weatherbee (crazyflight on these forums), who is moving from Yonkers, and captained a team that placed 9th in the MS National History Bee. So I think we will do better at HSNCT than before, given the sheer number of history questions.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Ithaca Cricket Ump »

Steak and Kidney Pie wrote:I should probably give an update on Ithaca, at least so people actually recognize the existence of areas of New York that are signifcantly outside of the metro area. We had some stupid losses at HSNCT, and missed playoffs when we really shouldn't have. (Evident from the scores of our games and consolation tournament results). Our primary loss is me, which honestly doesn't matter too much, because HSNCT has a very large amount of history and geography, which are categories I'm relatively weak in. (Decent in some areas of history, horrible at geography). I will be replaced with rising freshman Casey Weatherbee (crazyflight on these forums), who is moving from Yonkers, and captained a team that placed 9th in the MS National History Bee. So I think we will do better at HSNCT than before, given the sheer number of history questions.
Not to mention the fact that IHS returns Andrew Robertson, a rising senior (and Ithaca's top scorer at HSNCT this year) who could probably beat any upstate New York team of four in History Bowl playing solo, as well as having Casey transfer in. In fact, it would be positively criminal if an Ithaca team containing Andrew, Casey, Ari and Tracy didn't go to, and do very well at, History Bowl nationals in 2014.

The number one thing that will help Ithaca to take the next step up for them (that is, perennial national playoff participant) is to start travelling and playing in the good tournaments within driving range. Coach Kirk certainly wants to do this, but as with most schools in our area, available $$$ could be a problem. (Montrose, Cooperstown and Mountain View have also expressed interest in travelling to metro-NYC tournaments this year, although I'd recommend those schools start with novice tournaments to acclimate themselves some.) One of them, of course (BrainBusters Fall) is -hosted- by Ithaca, and the Upstate qualifier for and finals of the new New York State HSAPQ championship tournament will also be hosted by IHS this coming year, so that's 3 quality tournaments (I'm almost 100% sure that Andrew, Jensen, Ari, Tracy and Casey will qualify out of upstate, and have a very good chance to impressively run the table doing so) that IHS will have right in their own building(s) this coming season.

The finances worked against any travel happening this year, I know, but if you guys had been able to play in, say, Seton Hall, Scarsdale, the Kings Park tournament, Bull Bowl in Buffalo and Prison Bowl, and gained the requisite experience and canon familiarity, my guess is that 5-5 prelim record becomes at least 7-3, possibly 8-2 with some luck. The fact that you guys, along with Fisher Catholic, were probably the two best non-playoff teams at HSNCT this year is very impressive considering that you were going into that tournament almost cold as far as good quizbowl experience was concerned, as well as you personally making the NYS NASAT team despite pretty much everyone else on that team having played about ten times as much good competitive quizbowl in their careers as you did. Well done.

As far as other upstate New York and Northern Tier of PA schools go...it's really hard to call. Irit's science, comp sci, math and literature knowledge will be very hard for IHS to replace (although Jensen Lo has the biochem covered pretty well), but in that school they should be able to find a poor man's Irit, at least, who can make sure that there aren't any gaping holes in any categories for them. On NAQT questions, they're going to dominate any team from upstate just because Andrew, Casey and Ari have history, geography and RMP completely locked down, but the problems could come in other formats, or against higher levels of competition.

Bethlehem (from the Albany area) just won their second MasterMinds championship in three years this June, but they rarely play anything except that (MasterMinds is run on NAQT A-sets, so they're not playing Chipbowl or anything like that), although Dave Madden told me this year at Scarsdale that they have played in metro-NYC novice tournaments once or twice in the past and didn't embarrass themselves. We're going to try to get them at BrainBusters Fall this year, but just from their MM stats, I can't see them being able to hang with Ithaca, especially as the questions get tougher. They were demonstrably the best team in MasterMinds last year, so I would guess that the same goes double or more for any of the other Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse or Albany-area teams.

Montrose Area (from just north of Scranton, PA) had a team this year that had the raw talent (all of whom just graduated), if they had dedicated themselves to pyramidal quizbowl for a year or more, to be a playoff contender at HSNCT, and would certainly have gone far in the small-school division, but they played almost exclusively Chipbowl. A real waste of talent there, especially given that they asked me for help preparing for NAC, and I decided to sneak in some real questions to see how they'd react in the practice session, and they -really- enjoyed playing sets from the 2012 PACE NSC, so much so (coupled with having been screwed out of a high playoff seed at NAC due to Chip-piness...for what it's worth, they went 5-1 and beat Irvington in the prelims, and would have went 6-0 and had the overall #2 playoff seed but for the aforementioned shenanigans) that they're going to give good quizbowl a try next season. They have a group of rising juniors and sophomores who will be in a similar position next year, but almost certainly need a year of seasoning (and experience) before they're ready to really step up. They're another school that would benefit greatly from a year of playing every good weekend tournament that they can possibly get to, although if they do they're going to take some early lumps that a team like Ithaca won't.

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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Great Bustard »

Ithaca Cricket Ump wrote: Not to mention the fact that IHS returns Andrew Robertson, a rising senior (and Ithaca's top scorer at HSNCT this year) who could probably beat any upstate New York team of four in History Bowl playing solo, as well as having Casey transfer in. In fact, it would be positively criminal if an Ithaca team containing Andrew, Casey, Ari and Tracy didn't go to, and do very well at, History Bowl nationals in 2014.
This is interesting to hear; we'll certainly try and get our tournament off the ground at Ithaca this year. On the other hand, Bethlehem is very committed, looking to play more, and as a team of 2, made the JV national semifinals at NHBB Nationals this year. Ithaca / Bethlehem could turn into a great upstate NY rivalry. We just need to make sure that we don't have too many tournaments and not enough teams to play them in upstate NY. Aside from MasterMinds, I'm not sure what if anything Bethlehem has done with standard quizbowl - the tournament Scott refers to below was our Westchester regional last year where their JV team won the title, and their Varsity did pretty well. Bethlehem's biggest challenge this year will be finding sufficient tournaments to go to. They should definitely go to PHAT if they can make it up to Burlington, and otherwise, come down to the larger NYC tournaments (same with Ithaca, if they can make it, though they're more like a 3.5 hour as opposed to a 2 hour drive).
Ithaca Cricket Ump wrote:Bethlehem (from the Albany area) just won their second MasterMinds championship in three years this June, but they rarely play anything except that (MasterMinds is run on NAQT A-sets, so they're not playing Chipbowl or anything like that), although Dave Madden told me this year at Scarsdale that they have played in metro-NYC novice tournaments once or twice in the past and didn't embarrass themselves.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Northern Central Railway »

Standard-winged Nightjar wrote: This is interesting to hear; we'll certainly try and get our tournament off the ground at Ithaca this year. On the other hand, Bethlehem is very committed, looking to play more, and as a team of 2, made the JV national semifinals at NHBB Nationals this year. Ithaca / Bethlehem could turn into a great upstate NY rivalry. We just need to make sure that we don't have too many tournaments and not enough teams to play them in upstate NY. Aside from MasterMinds, I'm not sure what if anything Bethlehem has done with standard quizbowl - the tournament Scott refers to below was our Westchester regional last year where their JV team won the title, and their Varsity did pretty well. Bethlehem's biggest challenge this year will be finding sufficient tournaments to go to. They should definitely go to PHAT if they can make it up to Burlington, and otherwise, come down to the larger NYC tournaments (same with Ithaca, if they can make it, though they're more like a 3.5 hour as opposed to a 2 hour drive).
I recall having a conversation with one of the Bethlehem parents the Saturday night of NHBB nationals a few months ago - he said that they were considering going to one of the NJ NHBB regionals to get more competition than in upstate New York.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by The Polebarn Hotel »

I actually did see Bethlehem perform at our NHBB regionals in December - they did really, really well. I was actually quite impressed. I'm sure we can build up a mean friendly rivalry with them. :lol: Their B team of two placed first in the JV level, but I'm sure we can beat them if we work hard enough. I'm going to be studying hard to be an asset to the Ithaca team. I'm really looking forward to NHBB next year! :D

I'm still not exactly sure what all of these tournaments are, but I'm sure I'll figure it all out when school starts and I get settled in.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Peter Piper »

Last year my team and I ( Lynbrook ) went to the Long Island History Bowl at HHH West where we had a lot of fun. We are looking to get more involved in the circuit this year and I see that there are only two tournaments on Long Island next year and i do not see a History Bowl tournament on Long Island. We are very restricted transportation wise and it looks like a lot of the area's teams are from Long Island i.e (Great Neck, North Babylon, Kellenberg) so why are there not a lot of tournaments on L.I. and since we are looking to get involved in the circuit, where can we start?
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Adventure Temple Trail »

I think LIFT and KPAQT are on Long Island proper. Are you guys able to take LIRR into the City? If so, there are also tournaments hosted at Columbia and at Hunter HS, which might increase the count of tournaments within your range to four or five.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Peter Piper »

We can take the LIRR into the city but not with our coach/school. We will probably have to go independently but we will look into it and are there any teams that we can ask for advice?
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by BroNi »

Peter Piper wrote:Last year my team and I ( Lynbrook ) went to the Long Island History Bowl at HHH West where we had a lot of fun. We are looking to get more involved in the circuit this year and I see that there are only two tournaments on Long Island next year and i do not see a History Bowl tournament on Long Island. We are very restricted transportation wise and it looks like a lot of the area's teams are from Long Island i.e (Great Neck, North Babylon, Kellenberg) so why are there not a lot of tournaments on L.I. and since we are looking to get involved in the circuit, where can we start?
Information and Registration for Kellenberg's fall tourney (LIFT) is up: viewtopic.php?f=1&t=14833

Sure hope you can join us.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Insolvency law of Canada »

Any conclusions to be made after MIT Fall, or should we wait until after PHSAT?
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Edward Powers »

It is too soon to draw any hard and firm conclusions from MIT's Fall Academic Tournament, other than the obvious---Jack Mehr of SJHS and Joe Levano of Kellenberg are two of the most gifted players in our region and, quite possibly, in the entire country as well. Further, the results at MIT suggest that in addition to SJHS & Kellenberg, Wilmington Charter will also be a highly competitive team in our area, since Charter has signed up for many of our local tournaments and is clearly a gifted team. But PHSAT has a larger field than MIT and in addition to the above 3 teams, it also includes national calibre teams like DCC, Hunter & High Tech, as well as teams like Ridgewood and MAST who have very strong players returning and so these teams might also be very dangerous squads. And, of course, all tournaments give teams a chance to earn reputations for excellence, so every other team at Princeton this weekend will have such a chance in what promises to be a challenging field. But even after PHSAT, the year will still be young and all teams will have a chance to improve significantly before all is said and done, so hard conclusions will doubtless still be premature after Princeton. But it should be an enjoyable tournament, and I know my kids are looking forward to it.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Schmidt Sting Pain Index »

Edward Powers wrote:It is too soon to draw any hard and firm conclusions from MIT's Fall Academic Tournament, other than the obvious---Jack Mehr of SJHS and Joe Levano of Kellenberg are two of the most gifted players in our region and in the entire country. Further, the results at MIT suggest that in addition to SJHS & Kellenberg, Wilmington Charter will also be a highly competitive team in our area, since Charter has signed up for many of our local tournaments as well. But PHSAT has a larger field than MIT and in addition to the above 3 teams, it also includes nationally ranked teams like DCC, Hunter & High Tech, as well as teams like Ridgewood and MAST who have very strong players returning and so these teams might also be very dangerous squads. And, of course, all tournaments give teams a chance to earn reputations for excellence, so every other team at Princeton this weekend will have such a chance in what promises to be a highly competitive field. But even after PHSAT, the year will still be young and all teams will have a chance to improve significantly before all is said and done, so hard conclusions will doubtless still be premature after Princeton. But it should be an enjoyable tournament, and I know my kids are looking forward to it.
I agree with what Coach Powers said. St Joe's dominated all around (except the game between us in prelims was pretty close) and established themselves as a national contender. I think PHSAT will be a better gauge, since almost all the teams in the region will be attending, compared to only 3 at MITFAT. Also, we (Charter) will be at full strength this time around, as we only had half of our actual A team at MITFAT. However, I understand that St. Joe's will be missing Greg. Hope to see everyone there!
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by czheng0708 »

Now that PHSAT is over, what can people say about this circuit? The only thing I can attest to is the fact that Wilmington Charter A will give any team a run for its money. Thoughts?
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by jonpin »

High Tech is great as long as they don't neg themselves out of a game. Livingston is great as long as they don't psyche themselves out of a game.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by samus149 »

jonpin wrote:High Tech is great as long as they don't neg themselves out of a game. Livingston is great as long as they don't psyche themselves out of a game.
Yeah...eight negs in our first game back wasn't exactly the best omen, but TBF we were a bit out of practice, and I like to think we made up for it a bit with that last prelim game.

However, there a lot more teams in the top that was predicted a few months ago. At least in our playoff bracket, there was MAST (who apparently didn't graduate Reuben), Hunter, Ridgewood, and Charter B, and all of our games decided on a few questions. In the other bracket, St. Joe's, Charter A, and Livingston all went 4-1. The lack of crossover games does limit how much we can judge if one team would beat another. There's a lot of people at the top, and unfortunately we have to wait until Kellenberg/CSWIFT for more regular difficulty results from a hopefully better-run tournament.

Also, and I'm not sure if anyone else noticed this, but I don't know if these questions are the best gauge for judging the best teams in the state. They seemed off.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Banana Stand »

Also, stats have not or may not ever be posted so it's tough to compare ppb or any other meaningful stats.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Northern Central Railway »

Banana Stand wrote:Also, stats have not or may not ever be posted so it's tough to compare ppb or any other meaningful stats.
This may also be compounded by whether or not the stats (if they get posted) are accurate or not.

In terms of the discussion as a whole, while I did read in one of the playoff brackets yesterday, all I can really gauge the teams I read for by is how much they lost to DCC by (I read for DCC four times in the afternoon/early evening). Ridgewood was able to keep up with DCC until TU 15 or so, MAST was never really in their game with DCC, Charter B was able to hang with them for a little bit, and Hunter A made a late comeback but just ran out of tossups. I did read for Ridgewood vs. MAST; Ridgewood won comfortably.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Al Hirt »

With stats out, are there any conclusions people more knowledgeable than myself could make regarding our circuit? I just took a look at High Tech A's final round at PHSAT and I felt a mixture of shock and awe, among others.
As someone ran into the brick wall known as Charter A first round, I have to say, they're extremely suffocating in their strengths. About 3-4 of our 7 TUs were buzzer races and one was pick up after a neg. Any and all limits a team has in depth are exploited by Charter A.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Banana Stand »

I'll give it a shot. I still don't think PHSAT will be the best gauge of strength moving forward, when a team like Kellenberg didn't even make playoffs, but some teams definitely showed strength. High Tech appears to be the strongest team in the area right now. Their afternoon performance was pretty stellar, even with a reasonably close loss to DCC. Charter is a really balanced team who will also be tough to beat this year when at full strength. Hunter and Ridgewood remain very good teams even after losing some of their best players. Livingston had a strong playoff performance and their win against Charter shows that they probably shouldn't be underestimated by anyone. Even Bergen at 1-4 had a very good performance if you look closer at their ppb and loss margins. St. Joe's was missing Greg which hurt in some categories, but we fared pretty well in the playoffs. Again, PHSAT could've been a better measure if it had done some things differently, but these conclusions seem fairly in-line with what was predicted, and I'm looking forward to some upcoming tournaments that will shed more light on the region.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Schmidt Sting Pain Index »

I am completely in awe that High Tech was able to get 26 ppb in playoffs. That is pretty amazing, and I think that shows that they can live up to their preseason ranking. With us, I felt that we kept up with HTHS in prelims (we were terrible on current events, didn't get a single power and only last-lined. something we need to do better in.), but they were able to step it up in playoffs while we were not, with a few close games and a loss to Livingston (who we were able to later defeat in tiebreakers). In the final, we negged our way to the loss (5 negs to 0 for DCC), yet were one protested tossup away from tying the game. Right now High Tech is probably still at the head of the pack, and we are right behind them probably along with St. Joe's once they return Greg, who can get an additional history tossup or two to make the difference in close matches. Livingston might be in that group as well. When we played them it seemed as if they were 30ing every bonus, but their overall stats were not as impressive as other teams. However, they were pretty tough to put away in our tiebreaker as well, so they are definitely a good team.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by High Dependency Unit »

Now that we've actually competed in a tournament, I want to add Darien to this list, since we might play a couple tournaments in NY and NJ and we will play some NY and NJ teams that come to CT. We did really well for a team that had 2/3 of its scoring come from freshman and another 15% come from sophomores. We're probably going to be beaten by the good teams in the region, but we might be able to pull out an upset or two and we will be a lot better down the road.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Edward Powers »

Any news on Saturday's History Bowl results?

I know that St.Joe's lost in a thriller to Ridgewood, 290-270 in the Semi's, with Ridgewood sealing the victory with a Superpower on the last question. However, I only know that High Tech won its Semi, but I do not know who its opponent was, nor do I know who won the Championship match. Hopefully, someone can help here?

EDIT: Nevermind---I must be blind---all the results were posted on the NHBB forum here---imagine that---last night.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Al Hirt »

Out of curiosity, has any progress been made on a possible NJ State Championship?
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by SHP Pirate »

SHP has submitted a bid - still waiting to hear from NAQT. (May have to look to early May due to building availability ...) we will keep you posted.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Edward Powers »

I had thought SHP was looking at March 29th for NAQT States, but when I read Coach Z's post of this past Monday, December 9th, stating that that if SHP hosts it might be a May date due to building availability, I then claimed the March 29th date for our postponed GSAC XXI Tournament. If I can find a more convenient date, possibly earlier, I will do so, but for now the St. Joe's Annual GSAC will tentatively be held on March 29th and I will create a new forum post within a week or two so that those wishing to come can register for whatever the new date might ultimately be.

EDITED: For clarity.
Last edited by Edward Powers on Mon Dec 16, 2013 3:26 pm, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by SHP Pirate »

Still waiting to hear from NAQT about states. May 10 is certainly an option ...
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Important Bird Area »

State championship bids will be announced no later than Monday.

(Note, incidentally, that you are welcome to select a May championship date, but a championship that late in the season would not have a reserved berth to HSNCT.)
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by SHP Pirate »

Understood. But since my initial contact with NAQT regarding the tournament, I have lost the proposed date.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Al Hirt »

There aren't too many conclusions you can make about Saturday considering the snow, the fact it was an A set, and the fact at least four of the top schools in the area didn't attend/couldn't play, but...

1. Livingston has incredible depth. The fact Chris and David are each putting up 100 ppg when playing separately is a testament to their skills and knowledge. Not only that, but their success cross teaming is evident of strong support. Going forward it should be very interesting to see how this plays out with the other top teams in the area.

2. Doane Academy may be a new school to watch in the area. They went 4-1 in the morning, beating us (Deep Green A) and had the tournament's top scorer. In another bracket, it's likely they would have made playoffs.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by jonpin »

What I can tell is that the base of this region is quite strong. Looking over the shoulder to see stats at the end of the playoff stage, I think 9 or 10 of the 12 teams had PPB above 20, most clustered in the 21s or 22s. Granted, take an A-set deduction, but this still represents that beyond our very strong top, the region has a number of teams that will be competitive at nationals.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Northern Central Railway »

EBAcademicTeam wrote: 2. Doane Academy may be a new school to watch in the area. They went 4-1 in the morning, beating us (Deep Green A) and had the tournament's top scorer. In another bracket, it's likely they would have made playoffs.
One of my goals for the Mountain Lakes Invitational was to get some schools that do quizbowl but not NAQT/mACF quizbowl involved. In doing research for outreach, I discovered that there's actually a lot of quizbowl outside the normal NAQt/mACF circuit in NJ. Somerset, Warren, Hunterdon, Sussex, Burlington, and Salem counties all have leagues of some sort that use odd formats/questions, so I sent out snail mail invites to each school that I could verify actually had a team of some kind, with the exception of Salem county because I figured that travel distance would keep schools there from attending.

The response from Sussex county schools was really good (7 teams - all of those schools being a half hour or less from Mountain Lakes probably helped), 1 school out of the 6 in the Warren/Hunterdon league came, and Doane Academy came all the way from Burlington county. It seems to me that one of the reasons that NJ schools who do quizbowl don't go to NAQT/mACF events is because of the information gap - in multiple cases, they'd probably come if they knew the tournament(s) existed.

I also get the impression from talking to other coaches that have hosted tournaments on a regular basis that snail mail outreach for tournaments is something of a rarity in NJ. Perhaps we should do it more to get more schools involved in NAQT/mACF. I got 13 teams I normally wouldn't have, so I'd say that sending 143 mail invites was definitely a success. To any future tournament hosts, there's certainly some things that seemed to work/not work with the snail mail invites, but that's something for another post and involves theoretical aspects of marketing (for those that don't know, I'm one of the few non-teacher quiz bowl coaches - I work in marketing research).
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by fett0001 »

Northern Central Railway wrote:To any future tournament hosts, there's certainly some things that seemed to work/not work with the snail mail invites, but that's something for another post and involves theoretical aspects of marketing (for those that don't know, I'm one of the few non-teacher quiz bowl coaches - I work in marketing research).
I, for one, am very interested in seeing this post.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Edward Powers »

Any news on who won the New Jersey State History Bowl Champioship yesterday? High Tech and Livingston were in the finals, but there has been no posting about the result, at least as far as I know.

Edit: Never mind---I found the results in the NHBB Forum. Imagine that! Duh...
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Al Hirt »

Halfway through the year, I think it's safe to say the following conclusions can be made.

1. You probably don't want to walk into a room and see High Tech A across the table. At full strength, they've suffered losses only to two HS teams: DCC A at PHSAT and Charter A at QuAC. Their PPB is in the top tier of teams nationally, and I don't think there are too many teams that are going to knock them off their top ranking in the region (though St. Joe's is always going to give them stiff competition and might be able to topple them).

2. There are quite a few generalists in this region (including some who are hidden). While I don't think there's much doubt Jack is the best player in the state (if not the Northeast), there are plenty of other players who have generalist capabilities and put up numbers reflecting that. Esther, Reuben, Marianna, Joe and Mark from Kellenberg, David and Chris from Livingston, and some others all are likely to average near triple digits at tournaments. Of course, these teams also have solid support in their own right.

3. Any team that can learn science fast is going to have a big advantage against most teams. For some reason, science remains a general weakness in the area, with even the best players in the region having limited science knowledge. I guess it also doesn't help that QB science is generally different from the science people are taught to learn in school (or so I'm told). Again, probably one of the reasons why High Tech's been dominating the region recently.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by samus149 »

In the vein of Pat's first post here, I'll do a team-by-team sort of thing. In a descending order based on Fred rankings:

High Tech A (4): We have been beaten several times (by DCC and Charter A), as well as only winning games by 1 or 2 tossups (against Hunter and St. Joe's). Now that college/midterm stuff is over, we're gonna work on covering our main weaknesses (lit, fine arts) and ignoring others (sports).

Charter A (14): The despicable trespassers from Delaware, Charter's the only team in the NE to have beaten us (by 5 points), and they've shown that they have incredible balance, as long as everybody actually shows up to the tournament. Jamie's got lit/arts/general knowledge, Varun's got history/geo/absurd frauding ability, and Naman's got science. They can definitely hold their own, but are a bit variable, with 6 negs for one game at QuAC while getting 15 powers in another.

St. Joe's A (15): Jack is good. Quite good. Definitely best player in the state far as most people are concerned. He can do mostly everything...except maybe science. He's got an improving team, but I don't know how much more Jack can study outside of science.

Hunter A (35): Hunter A, quirky as always, is definitely not the one-Marianna team some people imagined it to be at the start of the season. She's got support with Jonathan and Sarah on history and science, and they can pull upsets occasionally. However, they are neggers, racking up 9 in one game at BHSAT and 4 against both us and St. Joe's, causing them to lose both games. They've gotten the closest to beating us without actually beating us (375-365 at LIFT), so as long as they keep their cool, they're definitely a force to be reckoned with.

Ridgewood A (45): Esther is kind of weird in that she can put up 5+ powers a round and still only get 16-18 PPB. She's got a lot of stock clue knowledge, and real knowledge in lit/RMP, but she definitely needs a team with people like Ben if she wants to stay in the top brackets.

Charter B (64): Charter B is a great team in their own right, and are capable of beating teams. Mohan's good at arts and general knowledge, while the rest of his team covers everything else.

High Tech B (76): Our B team is in a bit of a sticky situation this year. It was supposed to include Adithya, who's possibly the best player at our school, but he got roped into some ER thing on the weekends. He'll be going to nationals and maybe one or two regular tournaments this year, but for the most part, he's out. Instead, the team's anchored by Badger, who's yet another lit specialist, with a bit of support from arts player Sharan and other lit specialist Julian. They've got a lot of gaps to fill in science and history, but can make a dent in any tournament.

Horace Greeley A (81): Our biggest competitors from when we still :chip:ed around online, Horace Greeley is also great at real quizbowl. Max is a superb generalist, winning 5th at LIFT basically on his own. According to their coach, odds are they're not coming to many more tournaments in the area, but if they do, watch out.

Livingston A (87): Tied for 3rd at Princeton, Livingston is anchored by their two generalists David and Chris. They both scored in the triple digits while playing individually(ish) at Scarsdale, and together are quite strong. As of now, they can't beat any of the higher ranked teams, but if they keep studying they might crack top 50.

Scarsdale A (97): I've only played these guys once at Prison Bowl last year when we were all really tired, and they've only played one A-set this year, so I don't really have much to say about them.

Mountain Lakes A (110): Anchored by the returning player Michael, Mountain Lakes A has got some good knowledge, especially in social science of all places. They put up pretty good PPB but need to cover their bases to get more tossups.

Kellenberg A (114): Joe Levano won a tournament on his own, if that's any indication of how good this team is. They do scary well at a lot of tournaments, and are really good at history, though Joe might've hit the one man wall. They also wear suits to tournaments, which I find awesome.

Livingston B (123): I've never played these guys, so refer to the comments for Scarsdale.

Bergen Country A (139): Bergen lost a lot of players from last year, but still have Abhiram and are a fairly balanced team. They were in the playoffs at Princeton, and they should continue to improve as they year goes on.

East Brunswick A (154): Shravan, essentially soloing, is really good at history. Like really good. Like he once firstlined 2 or 3 college history tossups good. He's also good at geo, but aside from that, his team needs to back him up.

Hunter B (171): Hunter has a large pool of players, so nobody's ever sure who's on this team. They seem to have the same issues with consistency Hunter A has, getting the most negs of all teams at BHSAT.

MAST A (174): Our friends from the MCVSD kept Reuben this year, who is another generalist who has improved since last year. They've got history and A set stuff down, but need to study more to be competitive on higher level questions.

North Babylon A (185): These guys have got two main players in NASAT player Max and Emmanuel, and they got into the top bracket at BHSAT. They have the same issues with negging as some of the other teams, but are capable of getting points against high level teams.

Final note: More people in the state should learn science. It's not a weakness of the area per se as it is for quizbowl as a whole, and since we've got a bunch of housewrites coming up (LIST, Prison Bowl), the science should be legit.

EDIT: I can't grammar/number.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Banana Stand »

I don't know how much more Jack can study outside of science.
I found your analysis very accurate overall, Sean. I just wanted to say that I can study a lot more in my good subjects, but it sometimes goes off track due to being a sluggish senior with a Netflix addiction. Also, props to three regional teams in the top 15, including High Tech in the top 5. Our region has improved a lot since last year and I'm expecting higher nationals finishes from most teams.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Al Hirt »

The Livingston B that was ranked was probably them cross teaming (happened at Phaqt and Mountain Lakes), but regardless they're very good and will be a force to reckon with next year.

In regards to specific placements in competition, set/difficulty makes all the difference from what I've seen. On an NAQT A-set, we're definitely more capable of a higher finish because of current events/geo knowledge and my ability to cover more lit/science than I normally would on an IS set. The only team even worth comparing for a sample size head to head in our case is Mountain Lakes, who we defeated by ten at Princeton on an IS Set, won by triple digits at Scarsdale on an A-set, and lost by triple digits at UPenn on HSAPQ. However, there's no set rule in the region. Teams like Charter (which has Varun with formidable geo knowledge but also Jaimie with great arts knowledge) end up having no considerable boost while teams simply do far better on HSAPQ and non-NAQT like St. Joe's (which put up I believe its highest PPB of the year at QuAC) and Ridgewood (where Esther can put up a winning record completely by herself).

In any case, I'm glad we've gone without affiliation to quite a few tourneys this year. It's gotten the team far more motivated than they have been in the past and allows us to have far better competition. This time last year I hadn't even played a pyramidal tournament yet.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Schmidt Sting Pain Index »

The amazing depth of our region probably foreshadows a very high finish for NJ at NASAT this year, assuming it will feature some combination of HT people, Jack, Esther, Shravan, etc.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Banana Stand »

I am not sure if NASAT selection will be the same as last year, but I've come to the conclusion that NJ's team this year should consist of me, Sean, Rohan, and a possible rotation of Pat, Esther, Shravan, or others I'm certainly forgetting.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by samus149 »

Yeah, are NASAT tryouts happening this year? If they are, they should probably happen at St. Joe's or the state championship, depending on which place more people are going to.
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Re: NJ/NY 2013-2014

Post by Al Hirt »

Banana Stand wrote:I am not sure if NASAT selection will be the same as last year, but I've come to the conclusion that NJ's team this year should consist of me, Sean, Rohan, and a possible rotation of Pat, Esther, Shravan, or others I'm certainly forgetting.
Rohan powered this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shahnameh once. I'm not even sure what to make of that. He and Adithya playing together next year will be very dangerous.

I'd certainly be interested in trying out for NASAT, although I'm not sure how much added benefit my knowledge would bring to that team considering my overlap with Jack/Pat/Rohan.
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