Columbia has decent showing at national tournament
ATLANTA, June 11: After a 4-4 showing in the preliminary rounds, the Columbia Quiz Bowl team took both of its place determination games to finish as the #25 team in a field of 52 at the 2000 High School National Championship Tournament this weekend at Georgia Tech in Atlanta.
The tournament was won by State College (PA) Area's A team, which emerged from the double-elimination round of 16 playoffs with just one loss, to Governor's School (VA) A, a team that Columbia played - and lost to - in the preliminaries.
Columbia went 6-4 overall, scoring a total of 2,610 points. State College totaled 7,070 points while going 13-1, but they also heard 100 more tossups than Columbia did. Columbia totaled 15 "power" tossups, 83 regular ten-point tossups, and just three five-point penalties, the fewest of any team in the field. However, Columbia's bonus conversion was just 16.02 points out of a possible thirty, second-worst among top 25 teams (#21 Woodward (GA), 10.14).
With an individual score of 72.85 points per 23 tossups heard, Columbia captain Robert Flaxman was named one of the tournament's ten All-Stars, an honor bestowed upon those players whose individual scores were 72 points per 23 tossups heard or higher. Flaxman registered 10 power tossups, 56 ten-point tossups, and just two five-point penalties. Flaxman was the #10 individual scorer in the tournament, but the #7 scorer if only students who played in at least ten rounds are considered. He also had the fewest five-point penalties of any player who scored at least forty points per 23 tossups heard and played in more than one round. The tournament's high scorer was Kevin Roth of Eisenhower (MI), who averaged 123.85 points per 23 tossups heard, and who was the only player to score more than 100 ten-point questions (112). The leader in power tossups was State College's Jacob Mikanowski, who had 52.
The individual scores for Columbia's other players were: Mike Bisberg: 14 ten-point tossups, 4 power, one neg-5, 20.29 points per 23 tossups heard; Alex Frankel, 4 ten-point tossups, 0 power, 0 neg-5, 10.41 points per 23 tossups heard; Matt Gline, one ten-point tossup, one power, 0 neg-5, 8.67 points per 23 tossups heard; Owen Baker, 7 ten-point tossups, 0 power, 0 neg-5, 7.29 points per 23 tossups heard; Lauren Kitchen, one ten-point tossup, 0 power, 0 neg-5, 3.47 points per 23 tossups heard.
"All in all, I think we did pretty well," Flaxman said. "It was our first national tournament, whereas a lot of these teams go every year. We played Detroit Catholic Central at Princeton and actually almost beat them in the playoffs, and then later I found out that they actually were the NAQT national champions from the previous year. Then I really wanted to kick myself, because I knew it was my fault that we didn't win."
"At this one I felt a little better because there wasn't a time when I could really blame myself for a loss. The only close loss we had was to Livonia Churchill, but it was in the first round and so we could put it behind us." Flaxman says his favorite round of the day was the second place determination round, in which Columbia defeated Pasadena Polytechnic (CA) 315-295 to take the #25 spot in the rankings. "It was one of really three or four close rounds that we'd played all day, and it was the closest one that we actually won. Plus I hit my best question of the day in that round. The question read something like 'The only freshwater species of this animal is found in Lake Nicaragua,' and I just rang in and said 'Sharks,' and got the fifteen points. That was probably my favorite question all day, along with the bonus question whose answer was something we'd read on a restaurant menu the night before."
Flaxman says that, all in all, he thinks the experience was a positive one. "Owen and I are graduating, but the team is a mostly sophomore one, and with Bisberg, Gline, and Frankel returning, and Arvin Bautista moving up from the B team, I'd expect us to be competitive next year. We may not make nationals again, but I think we'll do well enough. And I was thrilled to have such a good year in my last year of Quiz Bowl - we made the playoffs in every tournament except the one I missed, and we won two of them, plus we had a good showing at Princeton making the quarters. We didn't have a lot of success in my first two years, but we've really come on in the last two." Flaxman will be attending Northwestern University in the fall, where he says he plans to continue with Quiz Bowl. "From what I've read at the NAQT website, NU's team isn't that great," Flaxman says. "So hopefully I can go there and start as a freshman like I did here at Columbia - that would be sweet."
COLUMBIA'S RESULTS AT THE HSNCT
Preliminary Round One: Livonia Churchill (MI) 305, Columbia 295.
Preliminary Round Two: Columbia 260, Kansas Champions 210.
Preliminary Round Three: Governor's School A (VA) 455, Columbia 300.
Preliminary Round Four: Columbia 270, Drummond B (OK) 15.
Preliminary Round Five: Hammond (SC) 300, Columbia 105.
Preliminary Round Six: Columbia 335, Drummond A (OK) 95.
Preliminary Round Seven: Westminster (GA) 365, Columbia 145.
Preliminary Round Eight: Columbia 325, Henry County (GA) 70.
Place Determination Round One: #B13 Columbia 260, #A14 Governor's School
B (VA) 180.
Place Determination Round Two: #B13 Columbia 315, #B14 Pasadena
Polytechnic (CA) 295.
INDIVIDUAL HONORS
Tournament All-Star (points per 23 tossups heard): Robert Flaxman, Columbia A, 72.85