The Quizbowl Resource Center

Welcome to another wonderful season of Tri-State Quiz Bowl!

These poll features haven't been used in a while, so what the hell, let's dust it off. Polls close on the 17th as the season begins. Let me know if I missed any team you think should be in the poll.

Perhaps I will be less lazy and make some predictions sometime. Until then, feel free to discuss away.

EDIT: I added PA teams and, sorry guys, the poll got wiped out. Cast your votes again!

We're winning right now, which I guess is pretty cool (Edit: Hunter is winning now, but I still believe in us). Anyway, I'll do a preview for us.

Darien A will most likely again be myself, Julia, Andrew, and Brendan, though Brendan's spot is in jeopardy and will remain so until he studies as much bio/chem as he does Roman history. The three of them are definitely underrated as players, but I'm probably overrated. Julia is a very strong lit player, and we'll have a very complete team if Andrew/Brendan/somebody can bring our science play up a level (right now it's bad, especially bio/chem).

Best Case Scenario: Julia becomes one of the best lit players in the country, Andrew and Brendan combine to get at least 3 science tossups per game on a consistent basis, I stay competitive with the best in history and make solid buzzes throughout the humanities, Jakob Myers chooses to skip HSNCT again, and we upset DCC or Stevenson in the final to win our first championship.

Worst-Case Scenario: Julia has no time to study, Andrew and Brendan don't improve, I can't keep up in the history arms race, and we exit the HSNCT playoffs anytime before lunch.

Note: Julia is doing Columbia Science and thus won't be playing a ton. I might solo a few tournaments this fall, as Andrew and Brendan's parents are stricter on college app work.

Darien B will basically be Middlesex A from last year, but replacing Grace with someone who knows high school math and physics (we've got some seniors who fit the bill). I still don't really know how good these guys are, and how much they're going to study, given we put much more emphasis on independent work than Middlesex does. Regardless, they should be good and will make playoffs at HSNCT. I would not be at all surprised if they can go t-33 or t-21 at HSNCT.

Darien C will more or less be our B team from last year. They don't study particularly hard, but we're making them work, and they should improve enough to earn a playoff bid, maybe winning one game.

Darien D will be closer to an average team. I don't anticipate them qualifying or earning a wild-card bid for HSNCT.

Ithaca doesn't graduate anyone. We're ranked sixth on the Morlan rankings, which is probably definitely too high. We haven't studied much. Expect little.

But instead of talking about us, let's make some predictions.

PHSAT is going to be pretty loaded. Luke told me Hunter is going, and we are going to try to make an appearance. I think it's going to be us in the final, but I could be wrong; I don't know how much work Alex Schmidt has put in (or if he has teammates?) and who is Exton HS? Anyway, I don't think we'll beat Hunter in the final unless Luke makes a clutch neg.

I think that the title of this thread should add PA, which has more teams in this region (see LVA, Henderson, Manheim, State College, Great Valley, DV, etc) than LI.

And as for general rankings combining the tri-state area (and upstate NY lol) with New England, I think Hunter and Darien will probably come out on top, in general, with us, Lex, and West Egg forming a tier below them, although any of us could beat those two teams (and each other). I'm putting us below Darien even though we beat them last year, just because I'm assuming that they've studied a bit.

I'm excited for the season to start so that I can see where we're at, so I can perhaps do a more in-depth analysis of each team and make better rankings. Can't wait for stats. Happy studying, y'all.

edit: I guess this means we're abandoning the other thread. Which is fine.

The Baking of the English Working Class wrote:Ithaca doesn't graduate anyone. We're ranked sixth on the Morlan rankings, which is probably definitely too high. We haven't studied much. Expect little.

But instead of talking about us, let's make some predictions.

PHSAT is going to be pretty loaded. Luke told me Hunter is going, and we are going to try to make an appearance. I think it's going to be us in the final, but I could be wrong; I don't know how much work Alex Schmidt has put in (or if he has teammates?) and who is Exton HS? Anyway, I don't think we'll beat Hunter in the final unless Luke makes a clutch neg.

I think that the title of this thread should add PA, which has more teams in this region (see LVA, Henderson, Manheim, State College, Great Valley, DV, etc) than LI.

And as for general rankings combining the tri-state area (and upstate NY lol) with New England, I think Hunter and Darien will probably come out on top, in general, with us, Lex, and West Egg forming a tier below them, although any of us could beat those two teams (and each other). I'm putting us below Darien even though we beat them last year, just because I'm assuming that they've studied a bit.

I'm excited for the season to start so that I can see where we're at, so I can perhaps do a more in-depth analysis of each team and make better rankings. Can't wait for stats. Happy studying, y'all.

edit: I guess this means we're abandoning the other thread. Which is fine.

If we go to PHSAT, I'll be soloing and our B team will make an appearance. Ithaca can probably have a strong showing at NSC - I'd put us above you guys since I negged three questions I absolutely should've gotten when we lost to you by like 45 last year. Again, we really can't tell until everybody plays, and we're probably not going to field a full lineup until at least ACF Fall.

The Baking of the English Working Class wrote:I think that the title of this thread should add PA, which has more teams in this region (see LVA, Henderson, Manheim, State College, Great Valley, DV, etc) than LI.

And as for general rankings combining the tri-state area (and upstate NY lol) with New England...

Fair enough. I might have a bit of a bias towards LI anyway since, well, I live here.

I placed the teams that I did in the poll since those are the top or upper middle tier teams that regularly compete in tournaments in the Tri-State area. Lexington travels... A lot. So does Charter, and so do you. Everyone else is in the region. (Except maybe Darien, but they're in Western CT, which is part of the Tri-State area anyway). I did consider adding PA teams to said poll, but I figured they were not in the region. On second thought, though, they don't appear to have their own thread, so perhaps I'll add GV and DV.

EDIT: Done.

edit: I guess this means we're abandoning the other thread. Which is fine.

There's another thread? You mean the one from last year?

Traditionally, PA has been a part of the discussion. It's fine though. It's all trivial.

I don't know If my team is worthy of being in the discussion, but we intend on being a contender this season.

NBQuizbowl wrote:I don't know If my team is worthy of being in the discussion, but we intend on being a contender this season.

Dang I thought you graduated! Yeah you guys will definitely do well this year, especially on the island. Just to refresh our collective memories, who's returning from north bab? I know you always had a big club, so I never could keep it straight.

Only Zachary Thomas graduated from the A team and his knowledge was pretty eclectic. He'd pull random stuff all the time. He's being replaced by Richard Joyce a junior that is good at science and math, something my team is lacking, so I can't wait to see how he does. Noah Rothstein, Matt Pecoraro and I are all returning. We definitely have more studying to do in the next two weeks.

This is my last season of high school quizbowl, the others are juniors and have another year.

Since I know Long Island the best out of all the sub-regions, and since I'm running a tourney there in two weeks, I suppose I'll offer my analysis of those teams and leave the others (NYC, North Jersey, Upstate, Westchester, PA, Etc.) to those who know them better.

West Egg: From the team that went t-13 at HSNCT last year, they return everyone except Jacqueilne; more importantly, the fearsome duo of Lucia and Allan are back and better than ever. I certainly see them being in championship contention at every tournament they attend this year, and hopefully they'll improve on last year's nationals finish.

Kellenberg: Matt York graduated, and we shall have to see who will step up to fill his shoes. I do predict this will be a rebuilding year for them, but they should still remain at least somewhat competitive nonetheless, as they still have many good (25-35 ppg) players in the wings, including... Matt's little brother

Port Jeff: The Eric Kilgore era is over. They have players that can at least put up points, but they have rebuilding to do since Eric was so dominant on the squad. Expect both their performance and tournament attendance to be significantly down this season.

North Babylon: As Haggai said, they return almost their entire squad, and while they'll miss Zach, they have Pat, Richard, or Ryan to replace him (unless they graduated and I'm not aware of this). They'll definitely do very well this year, and expect their performance to be significantly up.

Kings Park: TBH, I don't know all that much about their squad and its composition, mostly because I never have played them in my entire career (which is pretty dang ironic since our schools are half a mile apart on literally the same road). So I don't know who's out or in, but I do know that most of the graduation losses should be replaced and their performance should be somewhere between slightly and mildly down.

Wheatley: John Li is the future of this team, who have some serious rebuilding to do with basically their entire A team gone. The good news is that he alone is better than the rest of the graduating seniors combined! Okay, maybe not that good, but he still has the chance to do some serious damage, provided he can get some solid teammates. Until then, I suppose their performance will in fact be somewhat down from last year.

Hills East: Zach was ridiculously good. Dan and Chris also put up good numbers. All three have now graduated, so the club's future is bleak, at least for now. Time for some classic rebuilding.

Hills West: Brandon Epstein is gone, and so is this once-powerhouse team, bar a miracle.

Smithtown West: Because we haven't been analyzed in five years, and because we ain't that bad (but ain't that good either), I figured I'd throw my own team in here too. Cory and Bradley are good. Victoria is better. Cory and Bradley both have their finest strength in, of course, computational math, which never shows up. Victoria is more of a generalist. They all get good buzzes in science and lit, but they need a history and geo specialist. If they study, they'll do great. If they don't, they'll be in consolation all year long.

Smithtown East: I hear they will return to the circuit next year at... Harvard Fall. Oh god.

Other LI teams who went to a non-RQB tournament last year but can't quite be discussed as I know too little about them:
Plainedge (Kings Park)
Long Beach (Metro NY)
Commack (Col. Winter)
Valley Stream South (LIFT, KP)
Huntington (KP)
North Shore HS (LIFT)

But hey, props for showing up

So I think the teams can be ranked like this:

1) West Egg
2) North Babylon
3) Kellenberg
4) Kings Park
5) Valley Stream South
6) Smithtown West
7) Wheatley
8) Commack
9) Port Jefferson
10) Long Beach
11) Huntington
12) Plainedge
13) North Shore
14) Smithtown East

Did I get them right? Wrong? Blatantly, horribly wrong? I suppose we'll find out soon!

Hey Casey, Luke, Michael B and others...
Yes, Alex has teammates now. Most joined last spring (or later) so we're a work-in-progress. Still, these guys are eager beavers, so we'll see what happens at PHSAT.
Looking forward to seeing you all there, the first tournament of your farewell tour before shipping off to college. Maybe we can have all have lunch, unless higher powers forbid it (see NASAT).
It will be lonely next year...
See you soon!

Casey I think that "Exton High School" is probably Downingtown East. Their coach focuses more on county competitions, so they were forced to use a pseudonym. They showed some potential last year and could be a good team in the PA circuit if they improve.

That's definitely good to hear. It's looking like we'll be signing up a few teams for PHSAT.

I think one of the reasons (at least, for me) that a group lunch won't happen is because students from the same school tend to eat together. Personally, when I go to a tournament and there's more than one team from my school, I like to have lunch with the B and C (and D and E) teams and talk to them about how they did, what they thought of the set, cool powers they got, what they need to work on, etc. I'd be open to the idea, though.

Smithtown is in a couple of days and I'm super excited to see how this plays and what my team can accomplish.

The Baking of the English Working Class wrote:(and upstate NY lol)

WIth the graduations of Eric Wolfsberg (now at Delaware) and Brighton's David Kilbridge (now at Georgetown), Ithaca A is far and away the top team in upstate New York for 2016-17, so much so that I can't see another team in upstate even taking a single game off of them this season, unless Casey/Daniel/Andrey and whoever of James/Vaynu/Luc is the fourth do something really unusual like neg 9 times in a game or something. Fayetteville-Manlius, a team led by the talented Matthew Hasenwinkel that had a solid middle-of-the-pack performance at NHBB Nationals last year, is branching out into circuit play this year, but is going to have a bit of a learning curve to deal with, although I'd say that because of Matthew they're probably the pre-season favorites to win MasterMinds States this year. Upstate has some teams that will be solid in the small schools equation (chief of which are Cooperstown A, which came one game from winning a trophy at SSNCT last year and returns their top 3 scorers, and Brooke Martin's Galway team, almost certainly the best small school team in MasterMinds and maybe the best in Albany, period, post-Wolfsberg - although their vulnerability is that Brooke is basically the entire team and they haven't stepped out of their MasterMinds-only shell yet), but none of them are going to be able to hang with Ithaca A, whose ability to make a run at either or both national titles this spring will be completely dependent on their travels outside the area to play teams that can challenge them. I would even go so far to say, with the departures of Wolfsberg and Kilbridge, that the second-best team in upstate this year may well be Ithaca B, and I would change "may well be" to "probably are" if I saw that they rectified their major weakness from last year - lack of a literature player.

On the Pennsylvania side of things, don't sleep on Manheim Township and Great Valley, who both return 3/4ths of a lineup that finished T13 at HSNCT and 35th at NSC respectively. Both have one key weakness (Manheim Township losing most of their lit knowledge with Jake, and Great Valley having a bad case of the negs), but if they work on those, they could make some noise.

Alex Schmidt is a generational talent and could win SSNCT single handedly. He usually can't quite close the deal consistently enough playing full rosters with four contributors, but any studying he's done or teammates he's picked up could really make a big difference.

Ithaca A this year is going to be myself, Daniel, Andrey, and Luc. The B team is going to consist of James, Vaynu, Francesca, and Aidan. James has seriously improved at lit, enough to beat me to some things, and Francesca and Vaynu have begun to crack down on science and history respectively. Their newfound specialization is, I think, going to be enough to allow them to pull off more upsets (see: beating Hunter A by 5 points) this year, and make it to a few top brackets. They still have holes in other areas, like RMP and fine arts, that someone is going to have to take responsibility for at some point, but as it stands, they could do really well.

Also, SWISS just happened. North Babylon put up a solid ppb, but I think is going to have to get more powers in order to really crack into the top tier. It's strange, though, that Kellenberg had the opposite going on; a higher power rate but a pretty low ppb. I wonder how Morlan is going to deal with that.

edit: awk url fail

Another observation from SWISS: GNS is going to have a lot of trouble if Lucia and Allan don't find someone to fill their holes. One of them was clearly missing, but I can't see how they're a top-ten team when both of them are there. After all, they know a lot of the same things.

The Baking of the English Working Class wrote:North Babylon put up a solid ppb, but I think is going to have to get more powers in order to really crack into the top tier.

That is definitely true Casey. My team has stepped it up in the bonus department, which I'm very proud of, but we are going to have to be able to power more to be relevant. For the first tourney of the year I'm extremely proud of my team's performance!

True, and plus, Kellenberg was pretty dang explosive in those last few rounds; you and West Egg really got the worst of it. You lost both games by razor-thin margins, though.

The matches were super close, I had a few clutch negs in that semi-final match, so I keep wondering what could've been if I hadn't choked.

Snoopy wrote: I placed the teams that I did in the poll since those are the top or upper middle tier teams that regularly compete in tournaments in the Tri-State area. Lexington travels... A lot.

We'll be traveling a little less at least early on this year, since we're kind of rebuilding, though hopefully we'll play a tournament or two in the Tri-State area later this season.

Hunter and Darien will be a cut above everybody this year, with Ithaca and West Egg closer behind them, and then LVA, High Tech, Charter, Phillips Andover, and us (in no particular order) behind them. The order of this last tier will be thoroughly dependent on whether a given tournament is NAQT or a housewrite, which I think particularly affects us, Andover (who are very strong at arts), and LVA.

I'd expect our A team this year to be a borderline 7-3/6-4 team at HSNCT and then finish somewhere around last season's 32nd at NSC (which I promise I'll go to this year.) At least for MIT Fall this weekend, our A team will be me, Nick Rommel, Brendan Cantwell, and Preeti Shastri. Despite losing 3/4 of our A team from last year, I expect us to continue to neg a lot and be incredibly mediocre at science.

Just a heads-up that the NHBB Mid-Atlantic Championships are scheduled for February 18th at Princeton and registration is open at this link. If you have any questions, shoot me an e-mail. Thank you!

Hi! long beach here! We went to Columbia earlier in the year and did meh, cause we started with three people and ended up with two. But on dec 3rd we should have a strong team. In the LI regionals we should be a fierce competitor. My name is Eric, I am a sophmore, and I will be in charge of our team next year and the year after. Thinkin about hosting a tourny as well! Well thats all.

Welcome to the forums, Eric! Always nice to see more LI-ers here, especially ones who will be here for a while.

Happy to hear you'll be more active! Perhaps we can see you guys at KP or Columbia States, too. And if you'd like to host a tournament, feel free to reach out to us seasoned TDs. We'd be more than happy to help you out; it's a big undertaking after all, and there's certainly a dearth of tourneys on the island that you can help fill.

No KP, we dont have the funds. Our school only funds regional quiz bowl. When we go to columbia and such money comes out from our own pockets. SO, we are gonna try to host one later this year in april or something. We dont have buzzers either. Fun fun.

How would you guys rank the New York City teams?

So instead of there being separate state championships for Metro New York and New Jersey, is the Columbia Cup Spring Championship going to be the championship for both states?

I would think NAQT would be open to a site in either state hosting 166, the designated "state championship" set. However, none currently exists, and with the loss of the host benefit (with questions for state championships being free), I'm not sure anyone's eager to jump in and fill that gap.

On that note, when is Columbia planning to (a) post the Cup standings, and (b) open registration for the Spring tournament?

jonpin wrote: On that note, when is Columbia planning to (a) post the Cup standings, and (b) open registration for the Spring tournament?

I have no idea about the Cup standings, but I do know that registration is now open on the Columbia Cup website.