04-05 Alabama Teams

quizbowllee · Post by **quizbowllee** » Tue Apr 26, 2005 1:30 pm

Thanks, James. I'm glad to know there are no hard feelings.

A few other loose ends:

Steven, you were 2nd overall scorer at NAQT. From what I remember, it was:

1 - Evan (ISS)
2 - Steven (LAMP)
3 - Carter (CCA)
4 - Matthew (CCA)
5 - A girl from Altamont

Also, does anyone know if Cullman is going to PACE? I know that they qualified, but they are not on the list on the PACE site.

As for returning players, Mr. Klug said that all of his team at Holy Spirit are seniors.

I predict the best teams next year to be:

Covenant Christian
Brindlee Mountain
Cullman
ASFA
Southside
Grissom

Captain Cullman · Post by **Captain Cullman** » Thu Apr 28, 2005 1:39 am

Cullman will not be attending PACE. Two members of our team signed up for the ACT on June 11th before we got the information about PACE. We hope to attend next year.

Golden Tiger 86 · Post by **Golden Tiger 86** » Thu Apr 28, 2005 2:04 am

Nice to see Cullman representin' on the board...welcome. Good luck next year, y'all should be good.

quizbowllee · Post by **quizbowllee** » Thu Apr 28, 2005 9:11 am

Captain Cullman wrote:Cullman will not be attending PACE. Two members of our team signed up for the ACT on June 11th before we got the information about PACE. We hope to attend next year.

That's a shame... We were looking forward to seeing you there.

On a side note, the newly-formed Brindlee Mountain/Cullman rivalry is fun, but I hope it's not being taken too seriously...

AndyShootsAndyScores · Thu Apr 28, 2005 6:14 pm

Yeah it's kinda nice to have a rivalry with someone besides Arab. By the way, I'm guessing it's Daniel who's Captain Cullman, who on your team joined as MacGyver1999? This is where the rivalry started with his listing of his "occupation" on his profile (Beaten up on Brindlee Mt). I brought this to the rest of my team's attetnion and, needless to say, they were very angry.

Captain Cullman · Post by **Captain Cullman** » Thu Apr 28, 2005 10:35 pm

I don't know who MacGyver1999 is. He might be from our middle school.

quizbowllee · Post by **quizbowllee** » Wed Jun 15, 2005 3:12 pm

Having gone to two National Tournaments in the past two weeks, I thought I might make a quick statement comparing Alabama teams as a whole to what I have seen in recent weeks.

To make a long story short, we as Alabamians have a long, long way to go before we can compete with the best in the nation...

Here is a brief rundown of Alabama performance at the National Tournaments I was at:

NAQT:

LAMP went 5-5
Brindlee Mountain went 5-5

PACE:
ASFA went 2-8
Brindlee Mountain went 6-5

While those records aren't terrible, the margin of victory that we saw was pretty bad. Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology - the team that won BOTH of these national tournaments without losing a single match, beat us 745-115...

Despite this, I would like to strongly encourage all of the upper-tier Alabama schools to seriously consider attending either PACE or NAQT in the years to come. We at Brindlee Mountain will be hosting another PACE qualifier this year, and we are considering also hosting an NAQT qualifier. UT-Chattanooga also hosts two high school tournaments a year that serve as PACE qualifiers.

The questions at these national and out-of-state tournaments are so superior in quality to what we usually get in Alabama tournaments, that it is really a testament to how things SHOULD be. Please encourage your sponsors/coaches to participate in more national and out-of-state competitions. It's really worthwhile and will improve the state of the game in Alabama. If they have any questions, tell them to feel free to contact me personally.

Looking forward to Alabama Quiz Bowl 05-06!!!

-Lee

quizbowlmike · Post by **quizbowlmike** » Wed Jun 15, 2005 4:58 pm

If you guys are looking for more high quality tournaments to attend that are out of AL, you can feel free to head on down to FL. The University of Florida puts on a pretty good sized tournament (70ish teams last year in two divisions) with near 13 rounds of play for all teams.(NAQT style, no powers, untimed) Historically we've gotten FL and GA teams, but no AL ones (to the best of my knowledge). Also, the tournament will probably serve as a PACE qualifier again this year.

Also, FSU is planning on putting on a tournament, but this will be their first year.

-Doug
(yeah, i know, the name thing is confusing to most)

Byko · Post by **Byko** » Wed Jun 15, 2005 5:22 pm

What date are you guys at UF looking at for next year for your tournament? It's not too terribly far from South Carolina for us to make the trip down there to make some contacts in Florida and (if you'd like) provide a couple highly experienced moderators.

NotBhan · Post by **NotBhan** » Wed Jun 15, 2005 5:22 pm

quizbowlmike wrote:If you guys are looking for more high quality tournaments to attend that are out of AL, you can feel free to head on down to FL. The University of Florida puts on a pretty good sized tournament (70ish teams last year in two divisions) with near 13 rounds of play for all teams.(NAQT style, no powers, untimed)

I think UF's tournament in early December would be considered "modified ACF" style or softcore ACF or something like that, but the general point stands. It's a good tournament, and we'd welcome the presence of Brindlee Mountain and other Alabama teams. The field size has typically been capped at 48 teams (though the field was larger last year), but there should be plenty of room for any Alabama teams that wish to attend.

--Raj Dhuwalia

P.S. EDIT: In reply to David, December 2-3, 2005, is the date of the UF Fall High School tournament.

quizbowllee · Post by **quizbowllee** » Wed Jun 15, 2005 5:41 pm

Raj and Mike,

We'd love to make it to Gainesville this year. It really just has to do with money and scheduling. It just about killed us to raise the money to go all the tournaments we went to this year. Plus, Brindlee Mountain is in NORTH Alabama, so the distance to UF is considerable. However, we will definately consider it a possibility and see what we can do. I would be willing to bet that if you don't see us there this coming year, we will make an appearance in the near future.

We are already planning to go to both UTC tournaments, the Vandy tournaments, and Brookwood. All of these are depending on schedule and funding. Often these out-of-state tournaments conflict with one of the ASCA (Alabama Scholastic Competition Association) tournaments that are necessary for us to compete in locally.

Anyway, keep me posted on the tournament and fees and we'll see what we can do.

-Lee

DVader · Post by **DVader** » Wed Jun 15, 2005 8:01 pm

Actually our record was 3-7. Otherwise, PACE was a major learning experience/paradigm shift for us. The questions and teams were more difficult than anything else we faced before (with the possible exception of Walton) and our best playing simply couldn't match it. Even though we were trounced horribly, the trip was worth every penny for showing us the top tier of quiz bowl and a hint of what we need to know to get there. I can't wait for another run at state and nationals next year.

bigtrain · Post by **bigtrain** » Wed Jun 15, 2005 9:12 pm

The record of both Alabama teams at the PACE NSC(both of which we played) is probobaly a factor of the intensely strong field. I think that both of the Alabama teams in attendance will make a strong run in the playoffs in future years considering the young age of their players, especially if they do more preperation on PACE questions than what is used in Alabama's state format. I look forward to seeing you guys again at nationals next year.

quizbowllee · Post by **quizbowllee** » Sat Jun 18, 2005 11:33 pm

Thanks, Bigtrain, for your kind words. Our team was all freshmen at PACE. Myles, our lone senior, had a family emergency at the last minute. I felt bad for him, as he played his last round with BMHS without KNOWING it was his last...

Anyway, I'm looking forward to seeing what this group can do over the next three years. I thought our 6-5 record was decent for the first year. However, all margins were fairly huge, the ones we won, we won by a good bit... But the ones we lost...

They were bad...

ASFA played us fairly close, though...