Two Saints Conference

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The Two Saints Conference tournament is a high school tournament held each fall featuring teams from St. Louis County and St. Charles County (the tournament's namesake "Two Saints"). The tournament contains both a Varsity and JV division and includes such top St. Louis Metropolitan area teams as Fort Zumwalt West, Francis Howell Central, Eureka, and Parkway Central. Other teams that have participated in the past include DeSmet and Ladue

The St. Charles division of the tournament is run by Fort Zumwalt West coach Jeremy Gibbs, while the St. Louis part of the tournament is run by Eureka High School Coach Harris and other coaches in the St. Louis area. Gibbs is the overall director of the tournament.

History

2008-2009

The 2008-2009 Two Saints Tournament featured two St. Louis Divisions, a St. Charles Division, and a Private School Division. This expansion in the number of public school divisions was the result of an effort by tournament coordinator Jeremy Gibbs to expand participation by St. Louis teams both in the tournament and in Quiz Bowl in general. The creation of a separate Private School Division was at the insistence of DeSmet Coach Sothers for reasons unknown.

Though the expansion featured problems, including the participation of fewer teams than expected--partially because of the existence of the Private School Division, which stripped away the teams needed to complete the St. Louis area Division--it was nevertheless largely successful. Questions were by 2009 state tournament provider Questions Galore, with all of the attendant flaws, though the editorial work of tournament coordinator Jeremy Gibbs did strip the set of most of its blatant errors.

The 2008 Two Saints Conference championship was the second for Francis Howell Central as well as the second won by a St. Charles county team. One noteworthy aspect of the tournament was the last minute withdrawal of the Marquette team after its 1-2 record in the first half of playoffs. This withdrawal--and the subsequent elimination of all playoff wins and losses involving Marquette--caused a number of disruptions to the playoffs. Most noteworthy of these was the elimination of Marquette's win over Parkway Central, which made possible Parkway Central's second place showing by making PCH's record 3-1 instead of 3-2, tying it with Francis Howell Central and Fort Zumwalt West. The winner was thus determined using points per game, with Francis Howell Central edging out Parkway Central by 35 points per game, and Parkway Central beating out Fort Zumwalt West by slightly over a hundred points per game.

2009-2010

The 2009 Two Saints Conference tournament was won by Parkway Central, with Clayton coming in second. The Junior Varsity Division was won by Fort Zumwalt West, with Clayton coming in second yet again. The top Varsity scorer was Ikshu Neithalath of Clayton, while the top Junior Varsity scorer was Dylan Becraft from Fort Zumwalt West. [1]

Perhaps out of recognition of the many problems of Questions Galore, in the 2009-2010 season, the Two Saints Conference switched to questions produced by Show-Me Questions, the question writing company of former Savannah coach Bill Luce. As a result, though the questions remained largely anti-pyramidal and excessively short, they were free of the most egregious problems involving Questions Galore, the occasional hose notwithstanding.

Results

Year Varsity Champion Varsity Runner-up JV Champion JV Runner-up
2005 Francis Howell Central
2006 Clayton Fort Zumwalt West Parkway Central Clayton
2007 Francis Howell Central Fort Zumwalt West Parkway Central Fort Zumwalt West
2008 Francis Howell Central Parkway Central Clayton Fort Zumwalt West 2009 Parkway Central Clayton]] Fort Zumwalt West Clayton]]