Wilton
| Wilton High School | |
| |
|---|---|
| Location: Wilton, CT | |
| Coaches | James Koutsoukos |
| National Appearances | HSNCT: 2018, 2021-22 IPNCT: 2018-19, 2021 |
| Program Status | Active |
| School Size | 1330 |
| NAQT Page | link |
Wilton High School is a public high school located in Wilton, Connecticut. It's feeder school is Middlebrook.
Wilton is notable for being a team that consistently performs well at regional tournaments by answering tossups right out of power. Under the leadership of Alexander Koutsoukos, they were also known for having fewer negs per game than most high-level teams.
The Challenge
Between 2007 and at least 2012, Wilton had a team that competed on regional televized quiz show The Challenge. The team, which was coached by Terry Ragazzini, won the show's Connecticut State Championship in 2008 and placed T-4th overall in the Tri-State Tournament for the 2007-08 season.[1] Later on, the team, captained by Simon Brewer, tied for third at the 2012 iteration of the tournament.[2] The Challenge as a whole would be cancelled by 2013, putting an end to quiz bowl in Wilton for another three years.
Pre-Pandemic
2016-2019
Wilton Quiz Bowl was first founded in 2016 by freshman Alexander Koutsoukos and sixth-grader Lukas Koutsoukos from Middlebrook. Several tournament results have been voided for Wilton during this time due to there being a rule misunderstanding with NAQT as to whether middle schoolers from the same school district could compete for the local high school.
Wilton's first-ever tournament was an HS-only mirror of ACF Fall held at Yale in November 2016, in which the duo team went an exciting 1-11.
During this three-year period, Wilton came 2nd at the Tri-State Tussle in 2018 and went 8-2 at LIFT in 2017. They also went 6-4 in HSNCT 2018 prelims, qualifying for the playoffs. Furthermore, as a sophomore, Alexander was ranked #1 going into the playoffs for the 2018 IPNCT. He eventually ended up tied for 13th place overall.
2019-2020
With Lukas now being a freshman at Wilton High School, the sibling duo (with Alex now a senior) could now compete alongside one another without any rule issues. They came 3rd at Yale Fall with an 8-2 record and, at their best-ever tournament together on a regular HS set, they placed 5th at Bardbowl in January 2020 with a 7-3 record and 365 PPG. With PPGs of 77.50 and 60.50, the duo was less than 10 points away from breaking the Hoppes-Mikanowski limit.
A potential HSNCT 2020 appearance was canceled due to the tournament's cancellation as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Post-Pandemic
2020-2021
In the first year after Alexander graduated, Wilton came second at the Tal Atkins Memorial Tournament with a 5-1 record. They went 5-0 at Hawks' Nest but were notably originally denied nationals qualification by the tournament director for some time. They also placed 4th in a field of 64 at Run for the Roses.
At their first HSNCT since 2018, sophomores Lukas and Vihan went 5-3, narrowly qualifying for playoffs after a 50 point victory over Edison. They were eliminated in the second round of playoffs after losing to Darien on the final tossup.
2021-2022
The Wilton Quiz Bowl team got off to a strong start in online tournaments in the fall, winning the Tal Atkins Memorial and coming second at LQBA with over 450 PPG in each tournament. In the northeast region, they went 7-3 at LIFT, the first in-person tournament in the region since March 2020. In Round 2 of SAGACITY, Wilton performed a grail on Southside C in a 610-0 game (6/14/0). They also qualified for nationals after placing 3rd at East Brunswick Funfest, losing to Ridgewood in the semifinals but beating JP Stevens B in the third-place game. Later on in the year, they staved off a close 325-395 loss to Hunter to place 3rd, and went 8-1 to place 2nd at BAIT (hosted by Belmont).
At the 2022 HSNCT, Wilton qualified for playoffs after beating Saline 255-125 to go 6-4. They then beat John's Creek in round 1 of playoffs before taking a loss to McLean in single-elimination gameplay. Overall, they placed T-60 with a 7-5 record, the best ever record for Wilton at nationals. Lukas was 9th scorer in preliminaries (88.61 PPG) and 7th overall (87.50 PPG), and was the top-scoring junior at the tournament.
This school year saw Wilton field a four-person team for the first time ever (LIFT and HSNCT). It also saw the rise of Kieran Lenihan as the team's literature-centered player after having focused on geography in middle school. Since the team had no seniors this year, Wilton won't lose any players for the 2022-23 school year.
2022-2023
Wilton, losing none of the players from the previous year's team, started the year with a 7-4 record and 5th place finish at that year's PHSAT. A month later, the team went 9-1 and finished 2nd at LIFT, securing a berth for the 2023 HSNCT. Two weeks later, the team went 7-3 and finished 3rd at the TQBA Big Tex Bonanza. The 2022-23 season started off with much less activity than in normal years due to conflicts among upperclassmen with college applications.
Current Rosters (2022-23)
| Wilton roster | |||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Upperclassmen
Seniors (Class of 2023)
Juniors (Class of 2024)
|
Underclassmen
Sophomores (Class of 2025)
Freshmen (Class of 2026) Other Players (Class of 2027 and beyond)
|
Coach/President
Key (C) Captain (A) Alternate Captain | |||||||
Alumni
- Alexander Koutsoukos, Captain (2016-2020); current school: Caltech (Pasadena, California);
- Anjo Therattil (2018-2022); current school: Rutgers (New Brunswick, New Jersey)