On Monday morning, Audrey meets with Pablo in the weight room. Obviously, they have a lot to tell each other, especially when Pablo had his first sleepover with the quiz bowl team.

"A shame you missed that game against Peabody; if only you were there for this buzzer-beater!" Audrey tells him about the main highlight of the game.

"Did you score that buzzer-beater?" Pablo asks her.

"Yes. I scored ten points in that game. But every ninth and tenth grader on the basketball team kept asking me for help with their homework! Granted, not everyone for the same things, but still"

"Of course you would be asked for help! Your hoops teammates know how smart you are! But better this than getting bullied! Some of our quiz bowl opponents try to befriend people on other teams because they feel quiz bowl..."

"In a sense, better attend VA than some of our opponents' schools. Quiz bowl is still a new world to you; surely you have realized that some players play it because it's the only place they can be themselves at their respective schools!"

Like South Lafourche or Kinder. However, many quiz bowl-playing schools are magnet or private schools, Audrey pauses before asking him about a different aspect.

"How does it feel to sleep at your teammates' place?"

"Honestly, they are able to have fun without having trivia on their minds. They're nicer than I initially believed. If you may excuse me, I will need to go to the principal's office for the morning announcement!"

"Me too, but don't go around thinking that we're dating yet"

When the pair has finished putting their classroom clothes back, they go straight to the principal's office, knowing they don't have much time to deliver their teams' morning announcements.

"The VAs' quiz bowl A-team took first place and the B-team finished seventh at the LQBA Fall Invitational South last Saturday!" Pablo then hands off the PA system to Audrey, and gets to his classroom.

"As for the girls' basketball team, we won over Peabody sixty-three to sixty-two with a buzzer-beater! And we advance to the second round of the Acadiana Classic, playing Lacassine tonight!" Audrey delivers her announcement on behalf of the girls' basketball team.

If we win against Lacassine tonight, we'll play the winner of the game between Oberlin and Eunice, but they play on Tuesday, Audrey can't help but think about the implications of tonight's game, while going to her class with the other sports teams delivering their morning announcements, if any. I hope he realizes that, by playing with people like Nadine, or even me, he might gain some intellectual drive. I think him playing at LQBA Winter Invitational South next month is pretty much a given.

After the first period, Audrey meets with Pablo again.

"You know that, since you started playing quiz bowl, we started doing more things together. And not just quiz bowl practices or weight training. Just so you know, I am allowed to give out two free tickets for any home game. Do you want a free ticket for tonight's game?" Audrey asks him.

"I'll think about it" Pablo looks at his agenda, as well as the schedule of VA girls' basketball games. "I mean, yes, and you probably saw me play once or twice during football season"

"The season closer actually"

We're both athletic, and, even though her thighs are pretty thick, basketball obliges, she feels healthier than girls I keep seeing on social media, Pablo glances at her, before giving her a link to an emulator for the video game Nadine played during the sleepover party. Then he can think of the basketball game for which Audrey sent him a redemption code for a free ticket.

"Maybe playing quiz bowl wasn't so bad after all, and that I only had my inexperience to make me as neurotic as I have been in the past few weeks" Pablo explains to her, while he's about to confess something quiz bowl-related. "I still have a long way to go, but I feel dumb around other quiz bowlers sometimes"

"You don't have to be perfect" Audrey tries to console him while he's about to cry.

"I know I am not perfect, since I only scored a measly eleven PP20TUH at this tournament"

"How many PP20TUH did I score in my quiz bowl debut in middle school?" Audrey asks him.

"Certainly more than eleven"

"That's vague, but correct"

She then whispers him the exact number. But, after school, he returns home to finish his homework for the day, and then starts reading more past quiz bowl sets, a little bit older than the sets he read to prepare for the LQBA Fall Invitational South. Here goes nothing, Pablo sighs while reading a tossup on romantic poetry.

At night, he realizes that people bought more tickets than usual because the girls' basketball team is one of the VA community's only sources of athletic pride these days. And really, post-pandemic; while the rest of the parish recovered relatively quickly from the pandemic damage to sports, VA, on the other hand, struggled for years in the athletic arena.

As he makes his way to the gym, he comes across Tyler, who's carrying his borrowed drumsticks to the game.

"I guess the band performs during that game, either at start or at half-time" Pablo sighs.

"Both, but you must have realized that not everyone on the band performs at any given game, not even football" Tyler explains to him. "For tonight's game, there are four of us. Me because my girlfriend is playing, the first chair violin and trombone. And Virginie, a trumpeter"

Obviously, football games have the most musicians performing, but even then, not every musician performed at every game, Pablo's bulb lights up in his head.

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"That seems a little strange to me the conductor allows people to choose which sports games to perform at" Pablo asks his AP Biology classmate about band. "However, the band has two yearly concerts for everyone"

"I would say that it's not so problematic because of the hectic schedules of some musicians, like me" Tyler explains to him before he gets into position for the national anthem.

Speaking of national anthem, for the game, the girlfriend of the drummer performing at this game sings it at center court. Pablo reviews the VA roster for this game on mobile before the principal announces its participants.

"Welcome to the quarterfinals game of the Acadiana Classic, pitting, from Jennings, the Venomous Agendas, against, from Lacassine, the Cardinals. Best of luck to both teams" the principal announces the participants right after the national anthem ended.

The VAs' national anthem singer, Heather, is facing off against the Cardinals' center to start the game. She wins the faceoff and dribbles in an attempt to get past the opposing power forward. And then she passes on to Audrey, who shoots the ball mere moments later.

"The Venomous Agendas scored the first two points!" the principal shouts in the PA system.

The crowd gets noisy, and play resumes with the Cardinals running back into the VAs' zone, with the ball in their possession. As they attempt to pass, the away team gets the ball intercepted by Taylor, the VAs' point guard, who promptly returns into the offensive zone.

Once in the offensive zone, Taylor is joined by Carrie, the small forward, to whom she promptly passes. Feeling threatened, Carrie attempts a three-pointer. As the ball travels towards the hoop, the opposing players are drawn to it. They try to intercept it, but the Cardinals narrowly miss it. And the attempted three-pointer is narrowly missed, too.

By then, Heather positions herself to catch the ball as it bounces off the hoop. Once the ball is in her possession, she leaps towards the hoop and, as she stretches her arms, lets go of the ball once it's sufficiently high above the hoop. And scores another 2 points.

After that play, the Cardinals get the ball, and then race to the VAs' hoop by passing the ball around. Susan, Lacassine's shooting guard, attempts a three-pointer of her own, which hits the board and then enters the hoop. The VAs' lead is then reduced to one point.

Near the end of the first quarter, about seven minutes later, however, the VAs are looking to tie the score, and Audrey, a power forward, is awarded a free throw attempt, since, pressured by the opponent, she was fouled in a failed attempt to throw a three-pointer.

It's still early in the game, but because I just failed to put the three-pointer in, I must put in the free throw! A focused Audrey takes a deep breath before taking the free throw she's awarded. And... into the hoop it goes, much to Audrey's relief, scoring her third point of the game.

"End of the first quarter, the game is tied eleven to eleven" the principal announces with one eye on the scoreboard.

It's obvious the game is more defensive than the last one, a sweating Audrey muses while she reaches for her bottle of drink on the bench.

For the second quarter, both teams steal and intercept the ball even more than in the first quarter, leading to even less scoring.

"It seems like we have been unable to provoke fouls from our opponents" Audrey complains about what she perceives as a liability for the team. "On the other hand, we can't take too many fouls ourselves!"

"Yeah, letting the opponent take too many free throws is a bad idea" Heather comments on the implications of being provoked into fouls by the opponent.

"We can't always use the same strategy for the entire game!" Charlotte, the shooting guard, retorts.

"All right, by changing how we act with the ball, we can catch the opponent off-guard and then we can provoke fouls!" Audrey tells the team, who then gets more specifics of what to change from Kent.

Meanwhile, Pablo keeps studying for his other courses, such as Algebra II and, of course, AP Biology. Sure there are other girls on both teams I could find pretty, it's just that Audrey appreciates me for my proactivity and how willing I am to make an effort for her, he thinks of her while he realizes that she scored 5 of the 19 VA points in the first half of the game.

But even the changes made by the VAs only made it so that speed is the order of the day now. Especially on offense. Which makes everyone playing more tired, and faster. And, obviously, both teams are making more substitutions.

"This game can go either way, ladies, so don't let up!" Kent shouts while the opponent eats a fifth foul for the third quarter.

"We must keep provoking fouls! One more foul and we enter the bonus!" Audrey, now substituted for another power forward, tells her teammates in a somewhat tired voice.

Tyler, from his position in the second-floor bleachers, realizes that the VAs are being taken more free throws, especially when the Cardinals, when on the defensive, increase the physicality whenever the VAs get close enough to shoot the ball. It seems like the VAs are throwing more free throws in this game than they did in all previous home games this season! He sounds an incoherent tune as a bonus call after Cora, the second-string point guard, scored her first point of the game.

So, for the last 2 minutes of the quarter, the VAs get free throws for every new personal foul committed by the Cardinals in the third quarter. By trailing, the Cardinals' state of mind is deteriorating, their frustrations causing them to resort to more violent means to prevent the VAs from reaching the basket. Sometimes they get possession of the ball and might attempt to score, but this strategy didn't result in a whole lot of points.

And each new free throw they give away only seems to make things worse by repeated chants of Venomous! Agendas! accompanying each VA free throw.

And yet they take solace in the fact they only need to endure 2 minutes of being "in the bonus" before the quarter ends. At the end of the third quarter:

"End of the quarter, the Venomous Agendas are in the lead, thirty-eight to thirty-two" the principal announces to the crowd.

For the final quarter, of course, the second stringers start the period in an attempt to have their starters rested enough for the final 4 minutes of the game. Just before the 4-minute mark arrives, the VAs hold on to their lead acquired by making the opponent eat fouls.

"For the last four minutes, I'd say, Heather should be the one trying to provoke the opponent into fouling" Audrey tries to come up with a plan to hold on to the lead.

"Why me?" Heather complains about this role in this strategy.

"The Cardinals hope to gain possession of the ball on a missed free throw, and then go for whatever field goals then can score. You're pretty good on these, so it would make this plan an expensive proposition for them"

But then it doesn't seem to make the Cardinals try to bank on failed free throws as much. They reduce their reliance on fouling to gain possession of the ball, preferring to block and steal the ball without fouling instead. Which, of course, makes the game less painful to watch to some. But at the same time, Lacassine just feels like this nightmare is turning against them. Especially after they entered the bonus zone faster in the final quarter than on the third. However, this prompts the VAs to try to run out the clock without fouling.

It's not the best basketball game in the world, but for much of the game, people kept quiet in the stands, so I could still study for quiz bowl some, Pablo has his eyes fixated on the scoreboard's clock, right behind Tyler, who only signaled the start of the bonus zone during the final quarter. At the end of the quarter...

"The Venomous Agendas win, fifty-two to forty-six!" the principal announces, and the musicians then leave for the band room. "They advance to the semifinals!"

Pablo, too, is getting down to the VAs' locker room, waiting for her quiz bowl teammate. Until then, he keeps trying to write a bonus question on his cell phone. Once Audrey emerges from the locker room...

"Oh Audrey, even though it's not the best game in the world, at least you played well. It's your teammates that made the most to make the opposing strategy fail" Pablo comments about the game to her.

"Thank you. This means we have two more games to play, spaced two days apart, we'll play in the semis and then one more game based on the semis' result" Audrey explains to him, a little short of breath.

"If we want to give gifts to each other for Christmas, don't forget about the Black Friday or the Cyber Monday, but that's ok if you don't have a gift ready by then"