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NAQT Middle School National Championship Tournament

Tournament announcements, results, and discussion about specific tournaments.
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Charlie Dees
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Joined: Wed Jul 26, 2006 12:00 am
Location: Columbia, MO

NAQT Middle School National Championship Tournament

Post by Charlie Dees »

This tournament is going on today, and Ladue and Washington Middle Schools are sending teams, which I'm very excited about. Wish them luck everybody!

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Charlie Dees
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Location: Columbia, MO

Re: NAQT Middle School National Championship Tournament

Post by Charlie Dees »

Looks like nobody made the top 32 (or advanced to the playoffs), Washington went 4-4 and Ladue A and B both went 1-7.

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dwd50
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Re: NAQT Middle School National Championship Tournament

Post by dwd50 »

What an eye-opener for us. We learned so much about how to play as a team. It's too bad that we were totally outclassed by the higher echelon teams.

We played 4 scrimmage matches on Friday night, going 2-2 (with a win over an eventual playoff team.) The first scrimmage was against Barrington B, which wasn't even close. We hadn't been thumped that hard all season, and some of the outsized egos on our team couldn't process it.

We started competition still tight and dropped the first game, but stayed close. Longfellow C put a smack on us, but we rebounded to pull a come-from-behind win against Edmonson Co. (KY)

We never play well after lunch. Too bad the next 2 games were against eventual top 10 seeds. Independence A thrashed us, and my team threw down their buzzers in disgust. I have never been so upset at how my team acted. I pulled the 2 worst behaved starters for the next game. Which was Barrington A. There's a big dropoff from my sta rters to my subs, and we lost 655-0. We had to claw back to the 0.

Egos decimated, we finally got the teamwork concept, the "play the game because it's fun" concept, and finished with 3 wins. Solid wins.

Overall, this was a great experience for our team. I got some great tips, and plan to return. I think had we played at our potential, we could have made the playoffs, but not much further. Our season did not fully prepare us for the "Big Leagues."

That's the other thing. What level are we willing to get to? Some of these schools play in HS tournaments, have quiz bowl for a class, and practice constantly. I teach choir and am currently directing a show that opens in 2 weeks. I already feel like I'm stretched. I'm going to talk to my principals to see what we want to do next, but I don't think I or the school have the resources to reach that very top level. I hats saying that, but it's true.

It was worth it. I'd do it again. I'd stay at Motel 6.

Edit: Typing on a Kindle Fire is like doing surgery with your toes.
Last edited by dwd50 on Sun Apr 22, 2012 7:46 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Charlie Dees
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Location: Columbia, MO

Re: NAQT Middle School National Championship Tournament

Post by Charlie Dees »

Overall, this was a great experience for our team. I got some great tips, and plan to return. I think had we played at our potential, we could have made the playoffs, but not much further. Our season did not fully prepare us for the "Big Leagues."

That's the other thing. What level are we willing to get to? Some of these schools play in HS tournaments, have quiz bowl for a class, and practice constantly. I teach choir and am currently directing a show that opens in 2 weeks. I already feel like I'm stretched. I'm going to talk to my principals to see what we want to do next, but I don't think I or the school have the resources to reach that very top level. I hats saying that, but it's true.
I'm really glad to hear you say this was a great experience and that you'll go back. Everything I've ever heard about MSNCT has been incredibly positive, and I'm really happy that some Missouri teams are going.

I think a lot of the problem is as simple as this: there aren't enough good middle school invitationals. Right now good middle school quizbowl is very much in its infancy (heck, good high school quizbowl is still in its adolescence nationwide!) NAQT only produced 2 middle school sets this year, and there are a couple other sets out there that are pretty good for that level, but beyond that, there's really nothing. There are nowhere near enough middle school teams, and in Missouri we don't remotely have enough contacts for the teams that do exist, as there seem to be a lot of really fragmented mini-circuits out there that never interact with each other. MSHSAA bans middle schools playing in high school events, which is the best way to fill in the gap for middle schools who do want to be serious. There's no state title to serve a role in unifying the state circuit and catalyze growth, and we haven't found anybody yet who is willing to put in the tons of legwork it would take to set this sort of thing up. Unfortunately MSHSAA has a lot of weird rules about middle school, yet they don't actually bother to get involved in actually doing anything to make the game happen, which I find to be a worst of both worlds scenario. If somebody were to build up a middle school contact list, make a concerted effort at finding multiple hosts for every pyramidal MS set being produced, and organize a state tournament, I think that would go a long way towards helping teams like yours achieve their potential.

You don't have to have a special quizbowl class to be good, nor do you don't need to practice constantly. What is important is that you have the chance to play your fill of good tournaments, and practice enough that your players know what to expect and are given the tools to then make their own improvements outside of practice. It sounds like you are able to help with the second criteria, and now the main goal needs to be figuring out a way to make these tournaments happen and get other teams to be involved.

I hope with these newly active middle school teams we can find new people willing to host stuff and do the gruntwork related to organizing a statewide circuit. Unfortunately, there's already so much to be done at the high school level that most of us on the boards have our hands tied in terms of how much we can help.
I'd stay at Motel 6.
The one near O'Hare? That place was horrifying. When I stayed there in 2008 I found a mostly drank vodka bottle behind the TV of my supposedly clean room, and was woken up at 6 AM by a couple screaming and slamming doors before the man eventually left.

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dwd50
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Re: NAQT Middle School National Championship Tournament

Post by dwd50 »

OK - so the Motel 6 is out, but the Hyatt charges out the nose for everything. We'll find something.

Middle school is definitely growing in this state. 4 years ago, we played in one tournament. ONE. This was our 7th this year. As for me, I'm going to try and host 2 next year - one fall, one spring (probably a CMST mirror for Spring, Olympia or NAQT for fall). I will most likely scrap my individual events + quiz bowl format as well. That got expensive and time-consuming, plus it stole time we could have been playing matches.

FYI - we played a team of parents in consolation. As I was missing a player (already left) I subbed in for my first competitive game since 1996. Man I feel old.

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Charlie Dees
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Re: NAQT Middle School National Championship Tournament

Post by Charlie Dees »

I've stayed at the Radisson and the Holiday Inn Express near O'Hare before and they were both perfectly fine and right next to a shopping center with decent fast food, and are a few blocks away from the MSNCT hotel. I agree that that place is ridiculous and people really shouldn't stay there for the weekend.

Very glad to hear of your hosting plans, I think those will work out nicely.

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Mewto55555
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Re: NAQT Middle School National Championship Tournament

Post by Mewto55555 »

Nationals can be a scary place, especially the first time -- Ladue (high school) had a similar experience at HSNCT two years ago (one game out of the playoffs, finished barely in the top 100, played the eventual second-place team in the prelims and got destroyed, etc). What changed the next year that allowed us to get significantly better was that we began going to a lot more tournaments (8 or 9 compared to 2) and our A-team studied a lot more outside of practice.

If your kids really want to improve, then at home they should read easy-medium level high school packets -- a lot of what I've heard come up at middle school tournaments comes up at high school tournaments too, and the reason Kealing et al. do so well is because they've read a large number of packets and absorbed the data within. The biggest resource by far that improvement takes is the time of the kids to study on their own; all the necessary packets are available for free on quizbowlpackets.com


Also, Ladue HS is still hammering out our hosting schedule for next year, but I'm hoping we'll have another of those novice/MS combo tournaments.

It's too bad MSHSAA doesn't let middle school participate in high school tournaments; there are a lot more of those out there and more-skilled middle school teams would benefit greatly. That's another thing people should lobby to change.

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dwd50
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Re: NAQT Middle School National Championship Tournament

Post by dwd50 »

I think everyone came out of it feeling good, and like they belonged in the field. My 7th grade team did qualify this year, but the cost limited us to just the one team. What's the saying "wait till next year!"?

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