by Get Lynned » Thu Apr 14, 2016 3:02 am
That is a very solid post, Tyler! I think you covered the 2000's pretty well, especially considering the context you put in to some situations (the sentiment of Ike being a trailblazer of "playing the best, at the best tournaments, on the best questions", especially given his ambition, is pretty neat but it also makes a ton of sense given your framing.) Also, about Wheelersburg - they also won, I believe, some of the early titles for Columbus's In the Know television series. The other interesting thing is they are the only school I've ever read for where the superintendent of the district was a part of the entourage for the tournament (this an event put on by Greg @ Minford).
To interpolate some of my observations and what I generally understood to be true, in that 2005-2009 (maybe even up until 2012?) time period while there were some NAQT (and other TU/B) tournaments, there definitely weren't as many as we have seen pop-up and add to the circuit in the last three/four years. That may have influenced a lot of Ohio powers to play the NAQT tournaments in MI, KY, WV, and PA. I know that used to be a pretty common thing, although with more tournaments in Ohio I think we've seen more of the Buckeye state talent play in Ohio as opposed to out-of-state in recent years.
Seguing 2008/09 into the early 10's, we would be remiss to not mention the age of the small schools (I'd say roughly 2008-2014?). Ottawa Hills, who I understand was pretty darn good then (and would be by today's standards), won the '09 Small School title; Jarret Greene and South Range defended Ohio's crown in 2010; and Beachwood avenged their runner-up finish in '11 by winning the '12 Small School title. By the time I was playing, Ottawa Hills wasn't at many tournaments nor were they as strong, but even Beachwood and South Range - led by their respective duo's of Lizzie Bream + Ryan Reilly and Brianna Prislipsky + Christian Moore - were still top-10 teams statewide.
There's a slight gap between 09-12, that I'm sure someone else can fill in.
'11-'13: they aren't really iconic nor era-defining, but those two seasons saw the meteoric rise of two programs that either had not much experience in the game (Hawken) or had some experience in the game thanks to dedicated seniors that made them competitive, but were playing under an odd situation (Sycamore). The deal with Hawken, as far as I know, was it was basically four friends who liked quizbowl but wanted to do some damage and make a name for themselves. They finished second @ NAQT states in '12 and went 8-5 I believe at HSNCT. They had what looked like wicked good P-10-N stat lines. After they graduate, Hawken more/less stopped going to tournaments save for a few in the Cleveland area. Sycamore was a more peculiar situation. This group of kids wasn't the one that flaked out on OAC States, it was the ones previous to them. The other thing, and here is where my memory is somewhat jaded, IIRC they actually were not supposed to be playing *any* tournaments outside of the GMC. That obviously didn't stop them from playing at HSNCT twice (where they did rather well, too, lol) and tournaments across Ohio. I loved those guys, but it wasn't always the case. My sophomore year ('11-12), for some reason, was a rather acrimonious affair between Fisher and Sycamore, but my junior year we loved seeing each other at tournaments. Many a great memory, many a great game played between the two sides (they somehow managed to make the 2013 HSNCT bearable for me after my choke-performance in the afternoon after reaching 5-2). ...ANYWAYS, they were all in the class above me and when they graduated there was no more Sycamore to be seen. Sad stuff...
If there were one player not named Sam Blizzard, nor Northmont related I would say as being an era player for when I played, it would definitely have to go to Arjun Venkataraman from Dublin Scioto. Arjun and I enjoyed many great games against each other, be it NAQT States or Round 1 of the UK tournament (drove all that way to play them in round one... LOL), but he was one heck of a generalist and he was especially strong at science. The large reasoning behind my argument for a non-Sam player to be considered an era player (although not *the* era player, that's definitely Sam) for that time was that he was the impetus for Scioto (a school that never played quizbowl at all before he got there) to be more active in the circuit. If there were a "player tree" of forming the next generation of players, Arjun has probably done the most between the class I graduated in and a couple ones before that (Jarret Greene did more, I argue, but he graduated in '10.) The new face of Scioto quizbowl, Koh (along with his partner in crime Clark Smith), are both fantastic players in their own right, but my guess is that Arjun helped put Koh on the path to success when it comes to the ins and outs of the game, and in turn my guess is Koh did the same to Clark.
Thomas Moore
Ohio Wesleyan '18
Retired from online, for good.