After the prelims' award ceremony ends, an opposing coach, whose team is eliminated, asks the tournament director about the price of using the WWCHSQ set, while keeping in mind the field of this tournament is far from covering the entire field of quiz bowl-playing ladies.
"How much does Krasnaya Armiya charge for us to buy mirroring rights to this tournament?" TJHSST's coach asks.
"They charge about two thousand rubles per team, or about thirty dollars at today's exchange rate, and hence Red Army sets are much cheaper than NAQT"
The other big surprise in this tournament is Maine. They squeaked into the playoffs by narrowly edging out the Tri-State Area and take up second place in the Northeast pool, but behind Massachusetts, but is perhaps the most imbalanced team into the playoffs, with Kansas a close second. Their playoff opener against Kansas ends up being a neg-fest where both star players trade powers and negs in equal measure.
"Tossup number six: In medieval times, this Russian city was the northern terminus of the Route from the Varangians to the Greeks"
"Belgorod" the Stag answers after buzzing in.
"Neg five" the moderator announces, while Julie, the Maine star player, buzzes in immediately thereafter.
"Novgorod"
"Fifteen"
I am pushing the opponent to buzz in faster than they would like, then again so does she, Stephanie starts thinking while she feels the first bonus part is easy enough not to have to rely on her. After this gain of 30 points, then comes the next tossup.
"Tossup number seven: In 1983, this process was simplified among the Catholic Church under Pope John Paul II"
Both star players are locked into a merciless buzzer race, as the second clue is being read:
"An extraordinary form, known as the equipollent variety of this process, allows a person enjoying cult status..."
"Beatification" Julie announces after buzzing in.
Shoot! She beat me to a buzzer race! I'm not about to let her go scot-free if her answer proves incorrect! the Bishop Miège player muses while awaiting the verdict for this tossup.
"Neg five"
Time to buzz in! I was just a little too slow and this could have been mine to power! she thinks while slamming the buzzer, with an answer ready to go, without even one more word read on the second clue.
"Canonization"
"Fifteen. For ten points each..."
But not all tossups were negs followed by power-vulching in that game. There still were questions that neither side could power, nor were willing to neg on it, including tossup number 17, which is one of those that went to the FTP clue.
"For ten points, name this novel by Cortazar famous for the author recommending a specific nonlinear reading order"
"Rayuela" the Topeka-Highland player answers in her second buzz of the playoff game.
"Ten"
Kansas wins this playoff game, with no less than a dozen negs between both teams, six each from Stephanie and Julie, the Marshwood player, respectively first and second on the negs leaderboard.
"And that's the game. Kansas wins, two hundred ninety to two hundred thirty-five"
Clearly, as the playoff rounds continue being played, there are three teams that are poised to have an actual chance of representing the United States at the World Cup in Moscow, in late June. These teams being Massachusetts, Southwest Louisiana, and Northern Georgia. But everyone on the Kansas team knows their path to victory and hence to Moscow will require beating at least two of these teams.
And, to make this worse, two of the four Northern Georgia players are playing on their home turf, since they are the two female players of the host institution.
"This is round four of the playoffs of the 2036 US Women's World Cup High School Qualifiers, pitting Kansas against Northern Georgia. Best of luck to both teams, and here's tossup one"
Relax. They'll probably neg this one anyway! a Commerce player (or QuizCats as they are known internally) muses while the tossup is being read. We have yet to face the biggest opponents, but the next one will be far harder than Kansas.
"This empire first came to power because of Roman inability to defend itself against the Sassanids. The empress of this short-lived empire is today celebrated as an icon by Syrian women's rights activists"
An ancient empress celebrated by Syrian women's rights activists? This means the empire in question claimed territory in modern-day Syria, and on top of that, Sassanids on some border of it? Stephanie starts thinking furiously and then slams her buzzer.
"Palmyrene Empire"
"Fifteen"
Ouch. They powered the question but if you buzz in a lot, and power a lot of questions, you will usually neg some, too, the QuizCat history player starts thinking while watching, powerless, the Kansas players convert all 3 bonus parts.
As they expected, the game is fought tooth and nail, but with Kansas somehow keeping this game close near the end, with one tossup to go. Kansas still has a gap of 25 points to bridge, and the following question is their last chance to bridge it.
Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.
"Tossup twenty: The Theorema Egregium states that the Gaussian variety of this quantity is invariant in three dimensions under the local isometries. Calculating this quantity requires, for a curve, to take three partial derivatives of its parametrization"
This is not the sort of question I think I can power, so I wonder who can do so on this team, the QuizCat mathlete ponders while the Cedar Shoals and Chamblee Charter girls are both stumped on this question. And the history QuizCat player may as well forget about answering the tossup since it was obvious it was a math question. But the time for powering it is up.
"The diopter is a unit that is applied to this quantity in lenses"
An answer, quick! I might be wearing contact lenses, but diopters are for eyesight correction power! the QuizCat mathlete keeps thinking, and then her hand leaps into action, leading the QuizCat to press the buzzer, not realizing the answer contradicts the first two clues.
"Eyesight correction power"
"Neg five. For ten points, name this quantity that is nonzero when a line deviates from a straight line"
The gap has narrowed to 20 points, so someone must first buzz in for us to stay in the game against Northern Georgia! the player from Olathe North who, thus far, has been the lowest scorer on this Kansas team, starts thinking while the moderator starts ticking the three seconds.
"Your answer?"
"Curvature" the Olathe North player buzzes in before the third second elapses.
"Ten. For ten points each, please answer these questions on cost overruns"
Now it's down to 10 points. All we have to do is answer 2 of the 3 bonuses correctly, and we win over Northern Georgia, the Stag thinks, while various topics related to cost overruns come up that they fail to answer the first two of them correctly. It's all down to this bonus part, we answer this one correctly, our hopes for the World Cup are still alive. But most questions were on literature, art, history, RPMSS or science, with no current events or pop culture questions.
"This behavior describes a tendency to justify future expenditures on unfinished or underperforming projects based on past expenditures"
"Sunk cost fallacy" Stephanie answers.
"Ten points for this bonus, we're going in overtime. The game shall resume in sixty seconds"
Which one will we be getting from our opponents' star player, going into overtime, the one that powers tossups, or the one that negs tossups? She makes all of us nervous, the QuizCat mathlete keeps thinking, as they take a well-deserved break.
The first overtime tossup results in a twenty-point lead for Kansas since the Stag power-vulched Northern Georgia, but Northern Georgia powered the second overtime tossup. Which means that, going into the third overtime tossup, the onus is on Kansas not to squander their five-point lead.
"Third overtime tossup: This oil-on-canvas painting from Georges de la Tour..."
Both teams get lost on this tossup clues and, in a desperate attempt to preserve their five-point lead, the Stag buzzes in as soon as she feels able to formulate an answer, even if the power mark has been missed.
"The Card Shark with the Ace of Diamonds" Stephanie answers, sighing.
"Neg five. For ten points, name this painting that is prominently featured on a Chinese cookie box"
There's only one Chinese cookie box featuring a Georges de la Tour painting on it, the Chamblee Charter player thinks, while the clock is ticking on their answer window.
"Your answer?"
"Rixe de Musiciens"
"Ten. And that's the game. Northern Georgia wins, three hundred forty to three hundred thirty"
Oh crap, I caused Kansas to lose this game. We can still go to the World Cup, but we will need to play perfectly, from here on out, and not just against our next opponents, but given my erraticness, this cannot be guaranteed, the Stag thinks, while going into the next game room, for their next game, this time played against Massachusetts.
And this game was undoubtedly the worst loss incurred by Kansas at this tournament; even their game against Southwest Louisiana in the prelims still went into overtime, but Kansas lost in regulation against Massachusetts because the Stag ate too many interrupts. After the Massachusetts game...
"And that's the game, Massachusetts wins, three hundred eighty to two hundred ninety"
"Your incessant diet of negs caused us to lose our one shot at defeating the Red Army!" the Kansas coach yells at Stephanie once more.
"The Red Army? Why are you so fixated on having us play against the Red Army, as if the Red Army represented the apex of international girls' high school quiz bowl?" Stephanie asks her coach.
"We wanted to show that we could play quiz bowl with, and against, ladies of the highest level, while giving us an opportunity to act outside of KSHSAA's restrictive rules"
Even though the Massachusetts game has wrecked their morale, and made the lesser players buzz in less, which in turn, makes the Stag buzz in more to cover for the loss of willingness to buzz in, Kansas then goes on to win the next 2 games, with the Stag scoring an even higher fraction of Kansas' points.
But going into the game against Southwest Louisiana, Warren can't help himself but compare the Stag to Imélie's high school self. That Bishop Miège player is very much like Imélie in that she is strongest in M&S as well as history, and she feels intellectually solid, but unlike Imélie, she eats tons and tons of negs. A loose cannon, if you will.
A game where, despite their best efforts, Kansas still lose, with no dramatic last-tossup showdown unlike the preliminary round game between these two teams.
Kansas ends up finishing the playoffs with a 6-3 record, which makes it just wait for the awards ceremony to begin in the school's auditorium, and Kansas finished fourth. Once the final awards ceremony begins, a total of 15 books are on a shelf, as well as medals accompanying each of them, but no trophies.
"On behalf of the organizing committee, I thank you all for attending the United States Women's World Cup High School Qualifiers. It has been a wonderful tournament and I hope the use of Russian question packets has been a positive experience" the TD announces before the prizes are handed out.
"The bronze medalists, Northern Georgia! The silver medalists, Massachusetts! And the gold medalists, the winners of the 2035 United States Women's World Cup High School Qualifiers, who will represent us at the World Cup in Moscow, Southwest Louisiana!" the statistician announces while books and medals are handed out to the teams that earn medals at this tournament.
Individual scoring prizes are then handed out but restricted to players that played in the playoff phase. The statistician then prepares the packs of LED bulbs, before returning to the podium to announce the high scorers.
"As with the preliminary phase high scorers, it turns out the cumulative high scorers also win the power prizes. The third highest scorer, from Illinois, Marina Baiul! The second highest scorer, from Maine, Julie Jutland! And the top scorer, from Kansas, Stephanie Stagg!"
After the individual high scorer prizes are distributed, along with the power prizes, Stephanie is in for a surprise the statistician prepares to take out from underneath the podium he announces all the results from.
"It also appears that Stephanie became the high scorer of this tournament despite eating more than double the interrupts Julie ate, yet Julie was the second highest on the negs leaderboard. For this reason, Stephanie will be awarded a special neg prize"
Which turns out to be the actual legislative text of Title IX, in its current version. We were never given neg prizes in scholars bowl, but is it normal for a quiz bowl tournament of this caliber to award neg prizes? Stephanie thought, upon receipt of the Title IX text.
Historically, neg prizes like the one Stephanie received included material that might be funny to its recipient, such as action figures and books that are of no real use to a quiz bowler and were often awarded to players that score high but not necessarily at the top.