Bible Quizzing is an event that takes months of work to just be respectable at big tournaments. One such tournament is the Colorado Invitational, which in the last few years has become the second most desirable tournament to win in this author’s mind. After interviewing several people who were at the event, hereafter is my take on the event.
This year the quizzing began on Friday night. There was a buzz of excitement around Woodside Baptist as some of the latest Bible Quizzing ever took place. The quizzing began at about 7:30 but with all the east cost teams, it was as if the quizzes were taking place at 9:30. Some quizmasters were not as speedy as others, this became exaggerated when the quizzes began so late. Finally after midnight on the east coast, the quizzes in Colorado for Friday night were finished. Here were my thoughts.
1st-PVKY, 2nd-Woodside, 3rd-FBCCF
Due to fortunate scheduling, Woodside had avoided both of the other top three teams. PVKY and FBCCF were the two highest scoring teams, which I am becoming more convinced is a more accurate reflection of quality in a long round robin where you quiz against almost every team. I had no reason to think that any of these teams would do poorly.
4th-Capitol City, 5th-Old Paths, 6th-Calvary, 7th-Faith (MI), 8th-New York 2, 9th- Faith (SC)
These teams were so bunched up that it was difficult to tell what anything meant. I feel that the difference between 4th and 9th may be an unfortunate ruling–the teams are that close. Other than Faith (SC), the difference in total points per quiz was 8. Faith (SC) had the most high wins and the most points, but they also got low wins when they lost, which meant that they either had really tough matchups or just aren’t good at surviving in a mediocre quiz.
10th-Valley, 11th-Tri City, 12th-New York 1, 13th-Park Ave, 14th-Spring City
To me, what you have from 10-15 signifies the depth of a tournament. This is probably the strongest deep field ever in a tournament. Spring City did very well at Athens and came within 10 points of beating a top three team. Valley got 2nd at Athens. Park Avenue has won their state tournament 15 years in a row and placed in the top 5 at a major last year. And these are the resumés of the bottom third!!
Now what would happen on Saturday? Check back tomorrow for that.