Byko2000 wrote: The big thing with Chip is that year after year, he seems to find new teams out of nowhere that most of the rest of us have never heard of. It's even more amazing when these teams do incredibly well and sometimes beat some of the most well-known national powers. This may be one reason that the NAC is useful-- it lets teams that otherwise would not get the chance to do so compete against other teams from different part of the country. Teams from Montana, New Mexico, North Dakota and the Virgin Islands may have local formats, but the only time I know of Billings-Skyview High School competing against teams from anywhere else was in Beall's tournament. I think as the NAQT high school circuit grows, the NAC will have a lot more to worry about. We might do a better job encouraging teams from the extremes, western mountains or deserts to attend national tournaments run by NAQT or another "mainstream" quizbowl source that runs tournaments-- right now, Chip (granted, if you're good enough, Panasonic) has been most successful at this. Having experienced something like an NAQT tournament, I don't think many new teams would want to return to the NAC. An imagined prestige may be the reason why some do so, somewhat similar to why College Bowl is so appealing to trustees. Seeing no other alternative in 1997, my team (Altamont, AL) certainly thought this way. Not caring about plagiarized questions doesn't work for me. --Wesley (still wondering what happened to Grand Junction two years ago)
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