Then it so happens that they are in the home stretch, and depending on the strength of a team, Imélie will make decisions as to who plays and who doesn't during ACF Winter games. Nolan seems to be the one most likely to have playing time yanked for ACF Winter, but by then all five of them are knee-deep in studying past sets during the days to follow for ACF Winter. The South Central field is mostly unchanged from ACF Fall, with the main difference being that New Mexico State is not competing, and replaced by Texas B.
While the field might comprise mostly the same schools as with ACF Fall, the rosters, on the other hand, do not. There are graduate players at ACF Winter, on teams such as Texas A, and, of course, Tulane, and, for the big games against, say, Texas A, the third game of the day, Imélie tends to play more. Such as questions on math and computer science, which she answers faster and without complication.
But it appears that often, the hardest clue in that category refers to a piece of scientific news or a research paper. Then, on the final tossup against Texas A, her brain speeds into action when she hears this clue "quantum computing" involving this concept? Imélie buzzes in...
"Quantum entanglement"
"Ten"
Why must Imélie always be my kryptonite? Be it quiz bowl in high school or in graduate school... Bruce thinks while Texas lost a third game this season to Tulane, but the first time with him playing. Not that Alyssa is not good, but Imélie makes me feel inferior as far back as when I first played her. And not just because Imélie was a mathlete the way I wasn't. I mean, she was doing multi-variable calculus...
And going into the fourth game against Ole Miss, Nolan feels that the increase in question difficulty is dizzying him, causing him to buzz too early at times. Thus, he eats several interrupts that cost Tulane that prelim game #4.
"For the next game, you're benched, and Xavier is back in" Imélie then tells a Nolan that falls prey to dizziness. "Also, what makes you so dizzy?"
"Why?" Nolan asks, still a little shaken by the level of difficulty of early clues in tossups. "Sometimes I buzz in earlier than I would like"
"If we know why you're so dizzy now, we have a better idea of how to remedy this, to ensure we are not losing any further games like we lost this one"
Tulane cleared the field at ACF Fall, it's the first loss of the season. No biggie, so long as we're on track for doing well at Winter we should be in a good position for the Regionals; after all, she makes us read Regionals packets, Alyssa thinks while she steps up her game in games 5-7 due to Nolan's health not allowing him to play properly.
Speaking of game #7, against Rice, the last of the "must-win" buzzer races is asking about "something something Soviet" in Imélie's mind (as of midway through the TU). Which is made a "must-win" buzzer race because the Green Wave's lead is smaller than forty points, and they feel they must hold on to it to get into a better position going into the playoffs. That buzzer race features a tossup question on Cold War history. Then the usage of sports as a diplomatic weapon by the Soviet Union in the third clue causes Derek to buzz in, knowing the Red Army is an entity associated with the answer.
"CSKA Moscow" Derek answers.
"Ten. For points each..."
Why is it that, even though it's impossible, with the currently known information, to ascertain the existence, or non-existence, of any Red Army quiz bowl team, the Red Army must somehow rear its ugly head in a tossup? Imélie muses, irritated by disagreements over how they viewed the Red Army as a quiz bowl team last week. And how they appeared ready to play them. One fully converted science bonus later...
"And that's the game. Tulane wins two hundred eighty to two hundred twenty"
The team meets outside the door of the game room, after shaking hands with the Rice players. Oddly enough, both Rice and Ole Miss are in the consolation bracket, along with Baylor and Texas B, while Texas A&M and Oklahoma make it into the championship bracket. And, of course, Texas A.
"Going into the second stage of the tournament, we're tied for first, with six-one records, but don't go around thinking that the Regionals and especially not the Nationals will be anything like this. Especially not the Nationals if we make it, or rather, you make it because I will not be playing at Regionals" Imélie comments, while reviewing the schedule for the second stage.
"I never realized how good you were in actual games! You were able to contribute to practice when you make us mod drills, but no more than that" Nolan comments. "I was getting nauseated at the wrong time. I feel better now"
"Oh Nolan. It took you forever to answer what made you so dizzy. I'm glad you feel better now; we lost a game that we could have won and we gave away about a hundred and fifty points because of Nolan's nausea! But what matters now is the next three games. We can win all three and we can then stand a much better chance of hosting the ACF Regionals!"
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"Really? You think the ACF would award Regionals hosting to a school likely to qualify for the Nationals on their own?" Xavier asks his coach about whether a school's performance on ACF tournaments has an impact on its ability to host one.
"Tulane hasn't hosted any quiz bowl tournament in years. However, I think hosting a college tournament is easier for us than hosting a high school tournament, especially ACF Regionals, which is smaller than hosting, say, LQBA Fall Invitational South. If we can successfully host Regionals, then we can move on with hosting high school tournaments next year, but it will require more staff" Imélie then explains to him.
Oh Baylor; right now they are in the same shoes as we are, in that they have a brand new team, the main difference is they never took quiz bowl seriously, much less scouting. Oddly enough they are able to get what amounts to a good history and RPMSS player and a sideshow, Imélie keeps to herself, while focusing on the three opponents the Green Wave will play in the afternoon. It's a stunning reversal of last year, where we are the ones clearing house and we can clear the field.
Yet Imélie has a point regarding the logistics of running the ACF Regionals vs a LQBA Fall Invitational South-sized high school quiz bowl tournament. Fewer game rooms required. While I can always disguise the travel costs of ACF Fall or Winter into networking or client development, in which case my employer already sponsors the team without knowing it, what can I use to disguise the costs of room rental? Even though I know exactly why I want five classrooms and what the purpose of each of these will be, I wonder if I can have the room rental charged to my tuition bill for next term. On top of that, the only expenses of the team I didn't charge to my employer this season are the entry fees for tournaments; next season we will need to have players contribute to the expenses beyond my own, especially for tournaments other than ACF Fall, now that the program will get up to 8 players for next season, Imélie starts thinking of how to pay for the hosting of the ACF Regionals, knowing that the biggest expense of the tournament not borne out of entry fees is room rental.
It looks like the organizers tried to avoid having the top 2 teams of the prelims play against each other early in the championship bracket, so they have the 1 seed play against the 4 and later the 3 seed as their first two games. Then this means Texas A will play, in that order, the 3 seed and then the 4 seed, given that Tulane is the number 1 seed going into the championship bracket.
Therefore, this means that, going into the third and final playoff game, whoever wins this game will also clear the field since both teams are going into it with 8-1 records, and Tulane wins, triggering an advantaged final, in which Tulane only needs to win one game, but Texas needs to win two. With Nolan once again benched, the final game begins in earnest...
"This is round ten of the ACF Winter, pitting Texas A vs Tulane. Toss-up number one..."
Hopefully we will get to play someone new come winter. Calling this tournament, a winter one, is a misnomer. The South-Central quiz bowl collegiate circuit is very insular, by now we played against everyone, Alyssa reflects on her whole experience of playing quiz bowl for Tulane, when the first two clues on the first TU makes her blood boil. However, since it appears to be a science toss-up, she confers to Imélie on it, who buzzes in when she hears about chemicals-based medications.
"Pharmacotherapy" Imélie answers.
"Ten" For ten points each...
Chemotherapy is much, much more general than oncology alone, but the oncological use of the word fits the more general definition of chemo. I would have answered chemotherapy given the two clues heard before Imélie buzzed in. But no use dwelling on the tossup; focus on the bonus, Alyssa keeps thinking about the previous TU, but she snaps out of it fairly quickly, and answers the last 2 parts of the bonus.
This game plays out pretty similarly to the last 3 games between the two teams, down to how tight these games are. And also to the tendency of that Texas team to falter at the worst occasion. Here's to hoping we can win against Tulane and therefore the tournament, Bruce thinks to himself while the fatidic signal given by the moderator is given, with Texas in the lead by 20 points.
"Final toss-up"
The Red Army, again? Why is it that all the questions we get on the Cold War must involve the Soviet military? Never mind that we only had two Cold War questions on this set; history questions seemed to be pretty varied today, Imélie thinks, more tired than ever of hearing about the Cold War; pre- and post-Soviet Russia, however, did not make them feel the same. At the same time everyone seems to listen intently on the clues despite how they seemed to resent the topic because of a heated argument the previous week.
Here's my chance to show Texas we mean business! And to take the lead back from Texas but just getting the tossup correctly is not enough to do so! Derek thinks, while he tries to come up with an answer when the topic of Soviet war crimes come up in a clue.
"Pashtun"
"Ten. For ten points each..."
In Imélie's mind, the final bonus parts all come to a blur, and all that she remembers about these bonus parts are that Tulane needs to convert two of them, the first one is answered easily enough by Xavier, but the second one went dead. It's all down to this bonus part! Everyone thinks that when the final bonus part arrives, their hearts beat faster with every word being read on that final literature part, and their hands are all shaking atop their buzzers. Events in books that all seem to point to a specific king.
"Our answer is... King George?" Imélie hazards an answer.
"More information please"
Oh boy! The mod just prompted us on this, every second counts! Alyssa thinks while she filters information in her mind for which King George the bonus might refer to.
"King George... the third?" Alyssa answers, with her body seemingly shaking in her seat.
"Correct, and that's the game. Tulane wins..." they hear, while not paying attention to the score. Please stand by while the prizes are being prepared.
Once again, Tulane won the tournament, but it was much harder fought than at ACF Fall. Upon collection of their book prizes, they are herded back into the car for the long drive back to New Orleans.
"This is the worst weekend trip I ever took for a quiz bowl tournament!" Nolan comments, while Texas A&M wins the undergraduate title at Winter.
"I apologize for making you sleep in the car; we are a little short on cash as a team. We need to save up for the SCT and the Regionals as well if we don't host it. But if we make it to the Nationals, or the S/ICT, I promise you that we sleep in a nicer hotel room than we did for Fall, and I won't make you sleep in the car" Imélie then tells her players.