For the first time in nearly 2 years, in-person Quiz Bowl is back! The Long Island Fall Tournament, otherwise known as LIFT, hosted 20 teams, four of which were from New Jersey. Let’s see how the teams did:
JP Stevens A: JP Stevens A had a solid performance, finishing fourth overall with good stats(7.0 p/g and 21.42 PPB). Despite not playing full for the second tournament in a row, Stevens has enjoyed a relatively large amount of success based in their core of Nishanth Bhoryava and Kushal Aluru. Nishanth in particular had a good tournament, putting up 3.0 p/g and finishing 5th overall in PPG. Kushal continued his stellar science play, putting up 2.3 p/g and 40 PPG. Lauren made her season debut, putting up a respectable 11 powers and 12 tossups. Tijil Kiran, the team’s regular B Team science player put up 6 powers, a decent showing alongside Kushal. Stevens has impressed so far this season, winning games despite their lack of “field-killing” stats. A few questions for the future, however, remain. Will the combination of Sophia and Lauren on literature and fine arts make them national contenders? And will they be able to move past the second tier of northeast teams?
Ridgewood:
Ridgewood, led by the always amazing Aiden Dartley, finished 5th, a slight improvement over their 9th place finish at PHSAT. Ridgewood has put up the second best stats at both tournaments they’ve attended this year, but their lack of wins over competitive teams has led to some question marks over whether they’re true contenders. Regardless, a 5th place finish is nothing to scoff at, and Aiden has clearly put in even more work over the summer, finishing with an absurd 71 powers(more than the entire JP Stevens A team). Should Aiden find science support, the region will be in big trouble.
High Tech: High Tech played without any of their seniors but finished 10th overall, a respectable finish for a relatively new group of players. Led in scoring by Ranvith Adulla(1.8 p/g), the team put up a solid 16.78 PPB and 2.2 P/G. High Tech’s deep program enables it to consistently send strong players to tournaments.
John P. Stevens B:
John P. Stevens B finished 14th overall and was led in scoring by freshman Mihir Tadeparti, formerly of the John Adams Middle School team. Girish Subramani put up a solid 7 powers in a good Quiz Bowl debut. Although this isn’t the full B Team or even close to it, the players should be proud of their performance and we can’t wait to see their improvement throughout the year.
Other strong finishers are: Choate and Darien, both from Connecticut, who finished 1st and 2nd respectively. Our friends from New York, Hunter, finished 3rd, beating JP in a close final.