ICT Predictions?

[Ondes Martenot]

Any predictions for ICT DI/DII?

[grapesmoker]

Brown places last by not showing up.

[Kyle]

Andy punches a wall.

[dtaylor4]

Andy punches a wall.

I predict Greg Baboukis will do this again.

I see Illinois in the championship. I am biased, but with Tryg moving up, and with Greg actually showing up for once, I see them going far.

[Skepticism and Animal Feed]

My heart says Moneysota, but my brain says Chicago.

[Cheynem]

So, I like wasting time. So I took that college poll from January that ranked the top 25 teams and compared it to the NCAA AP Top 25 rankings that was conducted around the same time (the AP poll from January 19). Each team from the quiz bowl poll was matched to its corresponding team on the NCAA poll. I then compared it to what actually happened in the real tournament. This is pretty wacky because at the time the number one team in AP was Wake Forest, but here it is:

According to this pointless exercise, the quiz bowl "Final Four" would be: Minnesota (UConn), Stanford (North Carolina), Dartmouth (MSU), and Carnegie Mellon (Villanova--CMU has declined).

Warning signs would point to Brown (Wake Forest), MIT (Clemson), Georgia (Notre Dame).

VCU declined its bid--they matched up with Georgetown.

Of note: UCLA matched up with...UCLA.

So there you go. Using NCAA basketball as your guide, expect ICT to come down to either Minnesota, Stanford, or Dartmouth.

[NOSTRADAMUSHAHA]

IT IS TIME TO DO THIS AGAIN I HAVE LOST MY PASSWORD BUT THAT IS TO BE EXPECTED

We're doing this in reverse order this year, so hang onto your hats.

32. Queen's

I hate to do it, but Queen's leaves me no choice. Word on the street (by the street, I mean NAQT.com) is that they haven't accepted or declined the bid yet. Wishy washy Canadians get last place by default. If UIC gets a standby bid instead of them, rocket them up to the second bracket. I've got a good feeling about the Flames this year.

31. Tulane

Bravely seeking revenge for beloved slain professor Thomas Callahan, Tulane captain Darby Shaw and her comrades find little solace at the buzzer, but do manage to band up with rogue reporter Gray Grantham to figure out an international conspiracy that resulted in the assassinations of Supreme Court Justices Rosenberg and Jenson. And in NAQT, isn't figuring it out the most important thing?

30. Delaware

All of the incredible gains that they make from bringing in a mysterious new team captain known only as "Scott" are lost when a strangely homoerotic Quizno's oven is called in to moderate, much to everyone's discomfort. As an aside, do they still have Seth Teitler playing quarterback for them?

29. Illinois B

Donald Taylor capitalizes on a playoff-bracket packet error that results in thirteen consecutive tossups on the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, but Illinois B is relegated to the bottom bracket after a close loss to Cornell, when Barry Liu displays shockingly deep knowledge of the TV show Reba.

28. Oklahoma

They're bringing back their entire 31st-place team from 2008, so you know they've gotta be eying that 28th-place spot hungrily.

27. Alabama

I think that this passage sums it up pretty well: She owned that, ever since she had been a girl, she had dreaded being caught by her last leg, just as she was getting into bed, by some one concealed under it. She said, when she was younger and more active, she used to take a flying leap from a distance, and so bring both her legs up safely into bed at once; but that this had always annoyed Deborah, who piqued herself upon getting into bed gracefully, and she had given it up in consequence. But now the old terror would often come over her, especially since Miss Pole’s house had been attacked (we had got quite to believe in the fact of the attack having taken place), and yet it was very unpleasant to think of looking under a bed, and seeing a man concealed, with a great, fierce face staring out at you; so she had bethought herself of something - perhaps I had noticed that she had told Martha to buy her a penny ball, such as children play with - and now she rolled this ball under the bed every night: if it came out on the other side, well and good; if not she always took care to have her hand on the bell-rope, and meant to call out John and Harry, just as if she expected men-servants to answer her ring.

26. Truman State

Someone slips Kent Buxton a note saying that the TSU team will earn a free trip to be in the studio audience of Late Night with Jimmy Fallon if they finish better than 20th. A horrified Kent's points per game plummet.

25. Minnesota B

Since I don't know these guys at all, I certainly can't predict whether Mike Cheyne's flight getting in later than its scheduled 4:30 arrival time might doom them to a lower bracket than they might otherwise achieve.

[dtaylor4]

Illinois B 29th
Oklahoma 28th

If this happens, there will be three walls with blood on them.

[Auks Ran Ova]

"You took me off your radar. You shouldn't have done that." --S. Teitler

[Cheynem]

Ha-ha: It's actually a 4:00 arrival date! A whole half hour to play with!

[naturalistic phallacy]

My heart says Moneysota, but my brain says Chicago.

It greases the palm, man.

[Theory Of The Leisure Flask]

Ha-ha: It's actually a 4:00 arrival date! A whole half hour to play with!

We're not getting into DFW until 5, because of various morning classes.

I'm kind of nervous, actually.

[Frater Taciturnus]

Brown places last by not showing up.

Still beats VCU 405-100

[Important Bird Area]

It strikes me that predictions would be made easier by a field update.

DIVISION I
Alabama
Cal-Irvine
Carleton (UG)
Chicago A
Chicago B
Cornell (UG)
Dartmouth (UG)
Delaware
Florida
Florida State
Georgia (UG)
Harvard A (UG)
Harvard B (UG)
Illinois A
Illinois B
Maryland
Michigan
Minnesota A (UG)
Minnesota B
MIT
Oklahoma
Penn (flight delayed, 4/3)
Princeton (UG)
Queen's
Stanford
Texas
Toronto
Tulane
Tulsa
UCLA
WUStL
Yale (UG)

Standby team:
Louisiana-Lafayette (added 4/3)

DIVISION II
Alabama
Arizona State
Broward (CC)
Carleton
Chicago A
Chicago B
Chipola A (CC)
Chipola B (CC)
Carnegie Mellon (flight cancelled, 4/3)
Case Western Reserve
Davidson A
Davidson B
Gonzaga
Grinnell (declined 4/1)
JS Reynolds (CC)
Maryland
McMaster
Miami (Ohio)
Michigan
Minnesota (added 4/2 to replace Grinnell)
Mississippi State A
Mississippi State B
Northeast Alabama (CC)
Northwestern
Ohio State
Princeton
RPI
UCLA
Valencia A (CC)
Valencia B (CC)
Vanderbilt
WUStL
Yale

Edit: field update, 2:20 pm Pacific time, April 3rd

[The Goffman Prophecies]

Charles Meigs shows up at GUERILLA with a team of Chechen freedom fighters.

[cvdwightw]

Worked a bunch of numbers, threw each game into my not-yet-ready-for-actual-use simulator, and came up with the following results:

1. Chicago A (12-2) - survives top-bracket carnage, emerges victorious
2. Stanford (11-3) - loses to Irvine in Round 13 to lose one-game advantage, then loses to Chicago A 300-255 in final
3. Minnesota A (10-3) - kicks Brendan off A team for a litany of road trip rules violations
T4. Illinois A (9-4) - Mike Sorice continually befuddled by slow moderators, piles up negs
T4. Brown (9-4) - Jerry tosses a moderator out the window after losing to Florida State. It doesn't help.
T6. Minnesota B (8-5) - Brendan's pissed at the revolt, but can't finish any higher
T6. Irvine (8-5) - Puts up high scores, but top teams put up higher scores
8. Carleton (7-6) - sneaks in here when Andy Watkins has a meltdown in the tiebreaker game, manages a couple of upsets through Hilleman's coaching
--
9. MIT (10-3) - wins several close games, just got stuck in the Illinois/Brown bracket
10. Harvard B (9-4) - Andy finds wall after tiebreaker match, plays better in second bracket
T11. Florida (8-5) - Aaron Kashtan disrupts at least three concurrent matches with an anti-geography tirade in Round 11
T11. Florida State (8-5) - Billy Beyer, eager to regain his reputation, starts off on fire, then cooled down by Chris Ray's round of awesomeness
T13. Cornell (7-6) - plucky underdog team takes advantage of weak bracket, finishes respectably, just like every other ICT ever
T13. Chicago B (7-6) - they've got enough talent to beat the teams they should beat, but can't get over the hump against MIT or Harvard B
15. Maryland (6-7) - Chris Ray dominates weak teams, negs team out of close matches
16. Dartmouth (5-8) - inexplicable loss to Oklahoma sets tone for tough tournament
--
17. Harvard A (8-5) - seniors go off without much fanfare, stuck in a tough prelim bracket they can't find their way out of
18. Penn (7-6) - Mehdi still pissed about science
T19. Toronto (6-7) - Canadian team given a "Welcome to the big time" moment when Harvard B dumps them 325-125 in Round 1, in and out of rhythm all tournament
T19. Princeton (6-7) - Jordan Boyd-Graber disappointed that the new distribution is not 20/20 CS and 4/4 German
T19. Michigan (6-7) - comes on strong against other 6 seeds
22. UCLA (5-8) - Pulls up Tirth from non-contending D2 team once Avram retools his team optimization program Friday night
T23. WUSTL (3-10) - Gordon Arsenoff is determined to beat Chris Ray for the neg award, only to find out it doesn't exist
T23. Illinois B (3-10) - finds out third-bracket competition is tougher than bottom-bracket competition
--
25. Oklahoma (5-8) - Not even they know how they managed to win five games
T26. Truman State (4-9) - This time, Kent catches fire in the bottom bracket, making Gordon wistful he and Chris had switched statistics for SCT and ICT
T26. Tulane (4-9) - starts 0-8, then runs off 4 straight wins
T26. Queens (4-9) - one of their players misses the flight, so Rom ends up filling out the team and providing half their scoring.
T26. Texas (4-9) - don't budget enough time to drive in Friday, forfeit several prelim matches
T30. Delaware (3-10) - Bill Tressler decides he's had enough with Wilmington Charter and would rather coach a 3-10 college team than a national championship contender
T30. Alabama (3-10) - JT Thompson is befuddled when he no longer see students everywhere he goes; then his teammates break into his hotel room and start demanding picks for 5A Alabama football.
32. Georgia (2-11) - They're a better team than this, really, but after the whole D2 incident, NAQT's determined to write questions that Georgia players can't possibly answer.

[Mechanical Beasts]

Worked a bunch of numbers, threw each game into my not-yet-ready-for-actual-use simulator, and came up with the following results:

For what it's worth, you may want to run with the actual Harvard teams if accuracy matters to you as well as humor. (A is sectionals' B plus Kyle; B is Adam, Yi, Dennis, Brian Young.) Also, the lack of Brown thing.

[Mechanical Beasts]

I was working on more of these, but I got bored, so this is all you get.

"Valencia B" is actually Charles Meigs, playing his third Div II ICT. We all know real Valencia teams go by "Black" and "Red."

Ted Gioia flies back to Boston in frustration after he realizes that a timed format makes it difficult for him to groan "that's a terrible question" after every tossup he gets, as is his wont.

While listening to the ICT through the wire he planted on Seth's shirt at FICHTE, Jerry, who exiled himself to the New Mexican desert for everyone else's safety, erupts for the last time. Shreds of tossups on the Sachs-Wolfe effect rain down for miles.

Matt Weiner, sensing that he doesn't have any immediately pressing responsibilities, announces a singles event to be run after GUERILLA and promptly writes it while moderating. Event contains a common-link tossup on "films that end with a shootout in a cramped hotel room" written entirely about True Romance. Donald Taylor demands that playing the event should cost -$2000 for anyone who attended FICHTE II, but we all know that no one writes to da general.

Chicago, Minnesota, and Harvard find themselves in a circle of death because of some NAQT perversion. Playing it off on half-packets, seeded by points per bonus, Harvard is demolished by Chicago because of an error that put all of the 2/2 mass spectroscopy Selene performed in the past week in the first half of the packet. Chicago then narrowly defeats Minnesota, getting the advantage in the final, because Andrew Hart forgot to read the National Health Bill currently before the Nigerian National Assembly.

NAQT, in love with the idea that Chris Ray has some sort of championship win streak, realizes that the only shot that Chris has this year is neg-based, and, therefore institutes an award that Harry Nelson is quick to rename "Top Negro," nominally equal in prestige to Undergraduate Champion. Noting that Jerry is AWOL, Chris figures that he's got everything in the bag if Mike Sorice can't come through. After the first six games of the prelims Chris is behind but starts to make his move when Sorice's irritation at the questions leads him to curse for entire tossups at a time, making it impossible for him to neg more than one-fifth. Down two negs at halftime of the last match, Chris smells blood, but improbably the final four tossups of the game are on Trajan, the Prague Spring, the Battle of Kirina, and Chichen Itza. Sorice transcendent.

[AKKOLADE]

Comedic hotel room mix up between ICT players and WrestleMania competitors, leading to Jerry Vinokurov mistakenly winning Money in the Bank after all of Minnesota A is put through a table off the top of a ladder.

[Frater Taciturnus]

Comedic hotel room mix up between ICT players and WrestleMania competitors, leading to Jerry Vinokurov mistakenly winning Money in the Bank after all of Minnesota A is put through a table off the top of a ladder.

He will cash in the briefcase right after the finals leading to brown controversially being named NAQT champions on the biggest stage of all time.

[Kevin]

31. Tulane

If we don't finish better than 31st I'll pay back my scholarship. Or something like that.

[dxdtdemon]

I predict that Jacob Durst will realize that his teams always seem to perform way better than predicted at NAQT national tournaments in odd-numbered years, and channel that spirit to get into the DII final against Case Western Reserve. In the second game of the advantaged final, with the score tied, Steven Wellstead will think he had the game won when he realizes that the last tossup is an art question, however, a misplaced transparent history clue will appear in the middle of the tossup. This leads to a buzzer race between the four history majors playing for Ohio State, and while one of them will get the tossup right to win the DII championship, a fight breaks out.

[cchiego]

Don't worry Kevin, Nostradamus has a pretty spotty record of picking ICT, particularly at the lower bracket levels. Let's compare last year's picks:

1) Maryland. Correct
2) Chicago. Correct
3) Brown. (actual place: 4)
4) Illinois. (3)
5) Stanford. (7)
6) Vanderbilt. Correct
7) Harvard. (8)
8) Dartmouth. (11)
9) Williams. (13)
10) Florida State. (23)
11) UC-Irvine. (5)
12) Drake. (14)
13) Iowa. (9)
14) Carleton. (15)
15) North Dakota. (N/A)
16) Rutgers. (17)
17) Princeton. (22)
18) Florida. (10)
19) Alabama. (30)
20) WUSTL. (21)
21) UCLA. (29)
22) Stanford B. (25)
23) Georgia. (18)
24) Toronto. (20)
25) Illinois B. (26)
26) VCU. (16)
27) Harding. Correct
28) Virginia Tech. (24)
29) Rochester. (28)
30) Oklahoma. (31)
31) UT-Chattanooga. (19)
32) BEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEES! Correct.

Most overrated:
FSU, Alabama
Most underrated:
VCU, UTC, Florida, Irvine

[NOSTRADAMUSHAHA]

THIRD BRACKET PREDICTIONS

24. Michigan

On Saturday, the team can only go as far as Andy Kravis takes them. Unfortunately, that is only as far as the Whataburger on Shiloh and Kingsley, and Michigan forfeits all of their playoff games.

23. Cornell

Barry Liu's prowess on tossups about canceled mid-2000s WB shows notwithstanding, it is a frustrating day for the kids from Ithaca. The low point comes when Dwight Kidder insists on playing selected clips from The Wicker Man instead of reading the second half of their last prelim round against Alabama. Eugene Karlic achieves a small victory when he finally gets out that thing that was wedged between his two front teeth.

22. WUSTL

As the strongest supporter of the "Play Exactly Six Rounds on Friday Night" option, Neel Kotra feels extremely slighted by the fact that all prelim games are to be played on Friday night. He leaves nothing but shredded paper, splintered desks, and shattered glass in his rampage through the Hyatt. Matt Bruce is identified only through his dental records.

21. Penn

It's kind of anticlimactic when they do place highly and get a little trophy that's probably not even worth half of what they paid, so we have Penn at #21, far from any trophy-related anticlimax.

20. Toronto A

A tragic awards ceremony pileup involving Eric Smith, Jason Dickson, and Chris Lionel leads Jeff Hoppes to be named the official NAQT Vice President for Communication and Hallway Monitoring. Unfortunately, a swarm of Africanized Killer Dendroica mistake his orange vest and periodic whistling for the attack calls of the nefarious nest-stealing Pica nuttalli and peck him ferociously. His plaintive cries somewhat overshadow Chris Ray's top scorer prize award.

19. Texas A

Confusion abounds during their prelim-round "Red River Game" versus Oklahoma when Siddhartha Banerjee and Mark Molaro attempt to actually play against the Red River. Further confusion results when the river actually outscores Oklahoma. Eric Kwartler receives a scoring prize at the tournament, but because of NAQT's propensity to give trophies instead of books, is again thwarted in his lifelong dream to win a copy of Lafcadio's Adventures.

18. Harvard B

What a difference a year makes. Last year, there was all sorts of female intrigue surrounding this team. Would Meryl and Ted finally consummate their passion? Would Manny steal Ted's glory? It was a veritable soap opera. What do we have this year, aside from the endless speculation that Julia is somehow related to Ryan Westbrook? Nothing. That's what. What a disappointment, Harvard B. Your disappointing selves should be thankful you're in this bracket.

17. Princeton

Here is a rare behind-the-scenes look at how we do things at predictions HQ. Each of the following bullet points represents an idea for this Princeton segment.
-Jordan Boyd-Graber humor? He is after all a noted quizbowl hobo. Could maybe get some comedy mileage out of the broken arm in the shower thing.
-Kunle? Edited Buzzerfest. Some hard poli-sci or God's Bits of Wood humor might work here.
-Could maybe work in something about Subway Five Dollar footlongs. Wait, that would be a bit too much TV commercial related to sub sandwiches.

And here is the actual segment:

Jordan Boyd-Graber breaks his arm while shaving in the shower, while Kunle ghost rides a copy of God's Bits of Wood and Mason sings the Subway Five Dollar Footlong dance. Um, they play some games and win a few of them or something.

Brilliant. Art.

[OntarioQuizzer]

Toronto's better than a 20th-place team, in my opinion. Personally, I think they'll be second-bracket for sure, with an outside shot at the top bracket.

[ValenciaQBowl]

We all know real Valencia teams go by "Black" and "Red."

I'm amazed and touched that this is actually known. Meigs playing for us may not be that farfetched; I know he wants into the hot tub.

[OntarioQuizzer]

Toronto's better than a 20th-place team, in my opinion. Personally, I think they'll be second-bracket for sure, with an outside shot at the top bracket.

Also,

I nearly fell out of my chair when I saw that Queen's had qualified. Personally, I think that they'll come 32nd unless somebody shows up short-handed.

[Frater Taciturnus]

We all know real Valencia teams go by "Black" and "Red."

I'm amazed and touched that this is actually known. Meigs playing for us may not be that farfetched; I know he wants into the hot tub.

Considering that information was prominently mentioned in the Valencia Voice's CCCT preview, its not really that amazing. (The red and the black thing, not the meigs thing. No mention of Charles Meigs is made in the Valencia Voice's CCCT coverage.)

[olsb25]

You might want to drop us down a bit, since we're showing up with a 2-man team, which has about as much lit knowledge as I may have gained from editing Buzzerfest.

[ValenciaQBowl]

No mention of Charles Meigs is made in the Valencia Voice's CCCT coverage.)

Well, then it can't be true, since the Voice is now the paper of record for quizbowl.

[Sen. Estes Kefauver (D-TN)]

NOSTRADAMUSHAHA and Dwight both seem to have not noticed that Truman State isn't on Jeff's final list.

[jonpin]

I was noting a distinct lack of Truman and Brown in Jeff's list, as supplemented by an abundance of Yale and Tulsa, neither in Dwight's guesses.

[cvdwightw]

In all fairness, I believe both Nostradamus and I were using the field update posted as of yesterday afternoon, which showed both Brown and Truman State as having accepted bids.

Also, unless something weird happens, we are now playing with a three-man team of myself, Ray, and Brendan.

[grapesmoker]

Yeah, just in case there's any ambiguity, we are not coming due to various commitments all of us have during that time.

[dxdtdemon]

You might want to drop us down a bit, since we're showing up with a 2-man team, which has about as much lit knowledge as I may have gained from editing Buzzerfest.

Is Dan Humphrey still showing up for DII?

[olsb25]

Yup, our DII team is full strength.

[Important Bird Area]

Field update to my post above. Thanks again to Minnesota.

[swwFCqb]

I heard Carnegie Mellon's flight got delayed enough so that they'll have to miss tonight's matches. Can anyone confirm or deny?

EDIT: Never mind. I read the wrong thread first.