Comments on NAQT Midsouth SCT

tgallows <*no_reply_at_yahoogroups.com*> · Sun, 09 Feb 2003 23:58:43 -0000

Thanks to Charlie and company for an efficient, well-run tournament. 
The moderating cast did an excellent job, and the initial 14 rounds
finished just 9 hours or so after the start of play, including a
fairly long lunch break.  I did have a few comments to add ...

1.  I was going to mention this earlier, but I hope it's OK to discuss
specific questions, especially after Charlie's recent post which
included about 20 answers.  Just to be sure, could someone from NAQT
clarify this point (that it's OK to discuss specific answers now)?

2.  Charlie's "bragging rights" list is a little off -- I should have
mentioned it at the time, but I enjoy taking undeserved credit.  In at
least a couple of our matches, a tossup was initially skipped by
accident, then read later when the moderator noticed the skip.  So of
the 6 "bragging rights" tossups listed for me, at least one went
unanswered in my room, and one was answered by Jay from USF (Berbers).
 I did, however, get the one on the Witwatersrand which Charlie said
went unanswered.  I suspect the rest of the list may have little
errors.

3.  In my opinion, Emory B should have been ranked 6th in the final
standings, not 4th.  After the initial RR, the order was UF, Emory A,
Georgia A, FSU, USF, UNF, Emory B, Furman, and Clemson, after which
the top 5 played a lesser RR and the bottom 4 played a lesser RR. 
Clearly it made a big difference in Georgia's record to have faced
teams like UF, Emory A, and USF, while Emory B faced less experienced
teams from Clemson and Furman.  Regardless of whether the NAQT
guidelines included a specific dictate on rankings, the structure of
the RRs should (in my opinion) have automatically dictated that Emory
B be no higher than 6th and Georgia A no lower than 5th.  But as
Charlie noted, the order really doesn't matter in terms of NAQT bids.
 Also, I believe Emory B qualified for the ICT regardless of placing
4th or 6th by being the top undergrad team.

4.  Perhaps it was a function of rust thickness, but I thought that
powers were a bit harder to come by this year.  I think I had more
than twice as many powers last year in the same number of matches. 
I'm curious to see if this is a national (or international) trend or
just a local one.

5.  The Hale lead-in (as noted by the Gold Club's Steve Kaplan)
induced a neg with Free Soil Party from Mike Napier of UF as well. 
Overall, I thought it was a pretty good NAQT set of questions, aside
from a few crappy questions here and there (a shaky bonus of math
definitions and a sucky one on lemon-lime soft drinks spring to mind).

6.  In reference to Charlie's first post of results, I believe it was
USF (at 7-5) and not FSU (at 5-7) which placed 3rd.  USF is a greatly
improved team, and they played us (UF A) to our closest match of the
day.

     That's about it.  Thanks again to Charlie and UTC for an
excellent tournament.

--Raj Dhuwalia, UF