Because VA couldn’t afford to take part in spring football, it means the following week is the start of official football practices. This means the first week happens without contact and with contact the week after that.

The whole 45-player roster is assembled in the locker room with the head coach, with the traditional pre-season speech in front of the players, and the freshmen in the front row:

“Because we lost out on a playoff spot last season by a tiny margin, this year, we will need to work harder on the field! But to get there, there’s one thing I need to make clear: you want to make the wins happen, you must stop obsessing about individual stats or college scholarships! And there’s no I in team either!”

Ideally, this means putting the worst wide receiver against the best opposing cornerback, in which case, hopefully, our quarterback won’t pass to that WR. However, the problem is that it makes us more predictable to our opponents, especially considering that this lame-ass offense is going to cost us games this year again unless there was a diamond in the rough as QB, WR or RB among the freshmen, Pablo is left wondering how to make the most out of the limited offensive talent on this team.

“There is an opening apiece at running back and wide receiver on the starting lineup. Right now, these are wide open positions, so you will need to work hard during the coming weeks to start in the season opener! I must warn you, though: if you’re not the most comfortable with contact, but can still run fast and anticipate where the ball will be, you might want to play wide receiver” the offensive coordinator tells the freshmen.

And the offensive coordinator holds some drills to determine where a freshman will be the best fit on the team. Meanwhile, everyone else does drills such as obstacle courses. Then follow that up with other football drills that can be done without contact.

When the offensive coordinator is done evaluating the freshmen for signs they can play at either of the greatest offensive needs, the starters are announced for wide receiver and running back, at least tentatively.

“Please keep in mind that, depending on our strategy for a given play, you might be called upon to switch between wide receiver and running back. It will be a little awkward early in the season, but as the season progresses, it will get better. However, the same holds for our opponents!”

Damn it! They deemed RB and WR the biggest offensive problems, or at least the most fixable! QB is the hardest position to play and develop, Pablo ruminates about the issues of the VAs’ football team. And I sure hope that they won’t need too much academic help!

However, the depth chart doesn't lie: Pablo will still start as a tight end, and the starting quarterback is also known. He then reviews the football schedule since, by now, he knows that football schedules are set before quiz bowl ones.

So once the preseason depth chart is over with, they do some passing drills. For which he is assigned one of the new running backs. After the drill ends:

“For those who are new to the team, there’s one important thing: just because you’re on the team doesn’t mean you will get any favors in the classroom! Also, no-pass, no-play is assessed every six weeks, and all Rule of Two teams are subject to it. What you then need to do is, first, pass all your courses, and, second, keep at least a GPA of two point zero” the head coach harangues the freshmen.

No one in their right mind would play on an academic team, even FFA, if no-pass, no-play is going to be a problem to them! However, some of those footballers might have issues, Pablo tunes out the no-pass, no-play speech.

“Because the town only has a finite amount of pressure to distribute, and, this year, the math and quiz bowl teams are expected to bear the brunt of it, the town doesn’t expect the same out of the football team! This means you shouldn’t stress over games!” Pablo follows up.

“Quiz bowl I would understand, especially since Lilina is going to play on the A-team, but why the math team?” George asks him.

“Now that Trillian is in middle school, the pressure is on the math team to enter the race to the IMO as well as go deep into the Math Madness playoffs. Townsfolk talk about her as the best thing to happen to VA mathletics since, well, Gen...” Ethan follows up. “And Gen was a generational mathletic talent!”

However, any claim to fame Trillian currently has would not extend beyond the borders of the parish just yet, Ethan muses on just how she could fly under the radar elsewhere.

Since the start of the football preseason practices traditionally also marks the start of the preseason for all academic teams, quiz bowl holds their first practice later on that same day. However, for quiz bowl, any practices held before the start of the school year are optional. And yet, for some reason, the prospective middle school quiz bowlers are coming alongside the more established players of both middle and high school teams.

“I am Warren, biology teacher and the coach of the quiz bowl team. For those who are new to the team, please introduce yourselves”

“I am Marissa Chavez, a rising seventh grader”

Another new player, also a rising seventh grader, introduces himself. After that, the other quiz bowlers introduce themselves to the two new players. The other existing players read more packets while the two new players are getting an overview of the rules of quiz bowl. In Pablo’s case, this means focusing on science, since he feels like it’s his weak spot as a quiz bowler. Especially outside of biology since he took AP Bio last season.

Once the two new middle schoolers are done getting an overview of quiz bowl questions and rules, roster changes are then announced. Of interest to the quiz bowl faithful is the depth chart of the high school team.

A case of literary theft: this tale is not rightfully on Amazon; if you see it, report the violation.

“I know a lot of people in town will be a little angry but Leonard’s graduation forced our hands. Unsurprisingly, Lilina will play on the A-team this season. However, it appears that Nadine has outplayed Scott at the HSNCT. For this reason, and since Pablo proved to have good in-game chemistry with these two, Nadine and Pablo will both play with Lilina and Myriam on the A-team!” Warren then displays the complete depth chart on the screen.

“What’s going on here? It seems like I have been demoted!” Scott starts whining. “It seems like I gave my all for years, and you saw fit to put in a younger player ahead of me on the roster!”

“Yeah, it’s as if you ignored what we put on the table during the HSNCT!” Audrey adds to this chorus of complaints from the others who played on the A-team at the HSNCT.

Warren turns to Scott. “It’s normal to feel wronged when things go south. However, you had no experience playing with Lilina, who’s clearly our best history player now that Leonard graduated. I don’t want to take anything away from your contributions to the HSNCT run, but keeping you on the A-team is just not what’s best for the whole team right now!”

Maybe my basketball teammates, and even more so the boys’ basketball players, called me the brainiac of the basketball teams because, as a quiz bowler, I could answer the more obscure stuff the “mainline” players couldn’t, I was still able to score when it counted most, at State and at the HSNCT, Audrey ruminates before Warren turns to her.

“As for you, Audrey, Kent told me that, especially when basketball is in season, you won’t be able to devote to quiz bowl as much because not only you’re poised to be a key player on this basketball team, but also the majority of the quiz bowl season takes place when basketball is in season! We all saw last season the consequences of playing high-intensity hoops on your quiz bowl play when basketball is in season!” Warren harangues Audrey. “Your consistency decreased markedly at LQBA Winter, and we were lucky Pablo was brought in for Fall!”

Let’s see: there were LQBA Fall and Winter, ESA Cade Cane Classic and Leesville held during the basketball season. Only Tal Atkins and State were held outside of the basketball season, Scott reminisces about last season’s schedule.

Warren realizes the only dates currently set in stone are the endpoints of the season: Tal Atkins and State. It also shows that LQBA has historically prioritized scheduling State over LQBA Fall and Winter Invitationals.

“Audrey, don’t take it personally, and remember what Scott said last season right after this playoff run in basketball!” Pablo tries to reason with his girlfriend still under the shock of being demoted to the B-team.

“What do you mean?” Audrey asks him.

“It’s not that you play poorly, it’s because you just don’t know the same things as I do. At this level, making sure that players’ knowledge bases complement each other is critical!” Pablo rehashes what Scott told him after this playoff loss to Wossman.

“And it will become even more important if you wind up playing quiz bowl in college!” Warren warns his players after hearing about the importance of mutual topic coverage.

“College quiz bowl?” Marissa asks, clueless about the landscape of college quiz bowl, other than UPenn plays it.

“We’ll finish the practice with a little overview of the collegiate quiz bowl world. For now, however, we need to split the middle school squad in two for this drill” Warren tells his players before the high schoolers organize drills of their own. “Scott, as punishment, you will moderate today’s high school drills!”

Speaking of drills, the high schoolers are about to be drilled on collegiate quiz bowl packets. A warning is issued by Scott before the drills begin:

“For those who are new to high school quiz bowl, don’t worry: high school tournaments aren’t nearly as hard as the practice material we use. I urge you to give a chance to the new high school players” Scott starts reading from the latest ACF Fall set, which feels approximately as hard as the HSNCT to Scott.

And then the new players are dumbfounded by the steep increase in difficulty between the MSNCT and ACF Fall. That, even though the returning players were able to play just fine. Once that practice ends…

“I quit quiz bowl! I have a lot on my plate senior year, not sure playing quiz bowl is a good idea!” Scott yells and slams the door.

Pablo and Audrey also leave the room where the practice was held. He tries to comfort her after this demotion.

“What’s the matter, Audrey?”

“I feel… trapped! Victim of my own increase in hoops talent, which made the quiz bowl coach trust me less! I’m made to feel like I’m just secondary scoring at best!”

“If you were playing for, say, Leesville, you wouldn’t simply be secondary scoring, not in the slightest! We just happen to be playing for a nationally recognized quiz bowl powerhouse!”

“You’re right. Lilina and Nadine are both among the top history and literature players in the nation respectively, as of this pre-season. It’s not easy to score as a special topics player when you play with people like these” Audrey laments her situation on the buzzer.

If last season is any indication, you can go to quiz bowl-State with four random, straight-A students. All you have to do is win one game at LQBA-sanctioned tournaments, Audrey thinks, triggered by mentions of VA’s context.

“Also, Myriam is showing signs of burnout, so if she can’t play, or, for some other reason, I can’t play, or at least not at the standard expected of the A-team, you will be back on the A-team” Pablo seems to have picked up on signs that Myriam has lost some of her inner fire.

“Then I guess, I need to hope for the best…” Audrey sighs.

“Let’s backtrack a bit. You said the coach demoted you because Kent somehow saw your increase in hoops talent as a threat to your quiz bowl-playing ability?”

“Cora has improved more over the summer than either Heather or I did. However, if I improved enough as a basketball player to somehow, to Warren’s eyes, affect my ability to play on the buzzer… I’ll prove him wrong!” Audrey starts kissing him.

She then sets off to study science questions from past packets, based on who she knows plays on the B-team.

And yet, as a quiz bowler, it seems like I’m actually mostly within Audrey’s range, skill-wise. It’s neither of us’ fault if we are playing behind strong specialists! Pablo ruminates while he also sets off to study from other quiz bowl packets upon returning home. Then again, there’s a clear rift in quiz bowl talent between the power schools and the rest of the state.

His thoughts then turn to VA sports. Our football season rides on the backs of the new running backs and wide receivers. If they are good enough, we might be able to make the playoffs in football. However, I wonder if Cora has improved enough to make up for the shortfall left behind by Taylor and Charlotte graduating, but Audrey made it sound as if she did, and Heather, as well as Carrie, may have improved enough to put VA in contention for Division II Non-Select girls’ basketball-State this season. And, of course, herself.