I know it’s been a long while, everybody. I hope to get back on track with My Thoughts on Virtual Paper sometime soon (before the end of the month, for sure), but for now, I want to cover one of the up-and-coming tournaments that I was fortunate enough to attend: The DC Invitational.
Held at Fresta Valley in Virginia, the DC tournament had in attendance some of the more popular teams in the nation, including Old Paths, two Parsippany teams, and THREE New York teams, along with some great new teams, like Fresta Valley, Arlington, Fair Oaks, Crossroads, Boyes, and perhaps the most surprising team, Heritage VA. Allow me to take you all on a journey, an exciting trek if you will, past Machine Island in Georgia, and past “South of the Borner” in South Carolina, and past many Zaxby’s, and into the heart of our nation, Washington DC.
The Teams
Fresta Valley:
Three teams from the home school attended this event, and while they are still new and learning, they were certainly not foreign to me. At the Midseason Invitational in West Virginia, I saw the three Fresta Valley teams there, under the names of Alpha, Great, and Grape. That’s right, I don’t understand it either, but it’s funny to think about. Team 1 (Alpha) did okay in the Round Robin and managed to hang on into the latter stages of the tournament before being eliminated.
Arlington:
My favorite team, and even though I was a quizmaster and shouldn’t really have favorite teams, I liked them. They did okay in the morning, did okay in tournament, but managed to do rather well in the consolidation tournament of which I was one of the quizmasters. All in all, they are just a fun group of students who I hope to see more of in the future.
Fair Oaks:
A new team, of whom I saw a little over the course of the tournament. I don’t remember too much about them, unfortunately, except that on the last question of a quiz that they were going to lose, one of them gets up to answer my question “what have nests?” He answers: The birds of the air, sorry foxes. I thought that was funny. I gave it to him, FYI.
Crossroads:
A very skilled team with a star quizzer in Matthew Fusaro. They got knocked out of the tournament early, but quizzed very well in the consolidation tournament and managed to get second by only 10 points. Expect more of this team, I think.
Boyes:
A family team from Ohio that quizzed very well for being so young. They actually got 6th in the tournament, and had some of the best teams there, like New York 1 and Parsippany 1, struggling to get them the loss. On their final quiz, Boyes suffered from a backwards quiz-out by Wendy Boyes, who was their best quizzer, but still was only one question away from surviving. Not bad at all.
Heritage (VA):
Definitely an impressive team which, with the right training, could be very good in very little time. I’m talking, top 5 or 6 at NYC good. They quizzed very well throughout the day, specifically in the tournament, and while they got 5th, they were almost always dominating against another team. Multiple good quizzers and a good record really caught our attention at this tournament.
Parsippany:
Two teams from NJ made it to this event. Their number 1 team looked solid in the morning with no losses, and made it into The Final Four with one loss. Their number 2 team got out early, but really stepped up and won the consolidation tournament.
New York:
Three teams: the first, with star quizzer Faith Lofgren, and their second, with many good quizzers like Caleb Ludlow and James Watkins both made it to The Final Four, with one and zero losses respectively. Their third team, which was the winner of the Junior division at NYC, did a good job as well.
Old Paths:
Two time returning champion, but could they win again without the like of Matt or Tim on their team. They looked very strong and with no losses going into The Final Four, it looked like a rewind.
The Final Four
With New York 2 out with a bye, the finals got started with a bang as Faith Lofgren from New York 1 quizzed out early. However, both Old Paths, and then near the end, Parsippany made a comeback to eliminate New York 1 from the tournament. New York 2 then came in and it was a shut out for Parsippany, leaving the final two teams to battle it out. Of course, the results were obvious. Unfortunately, Old Paths still has the 2nd place curse, and while they managed to beat New York 2 once to give them their first loss, New York beat them twice to take the championship.
Final notes:
Expect to see some good competition from both Old Paths and New York at the coming tournaments. No doubt in my mind that PVKY is still on top, and FBC-CF a close second, but we could see an upset this year. Remember, last year New York got an amazing second place at AACS, beating Old Paths and PVKY, and having a strong lead on FBC-CF at the beginning of their last quiz. And also remember, Old Paths is the returning SCQANIT champion. As the weeks to Nationals get smaller and smaller, the excitement gets bigger and bigger!
Jesse