Leesville Road High School suffered a bitter defeat on Saturday, December 4 at the annual WRAL Brain Game meet.
Leesville competed against Terry Sanford High School and Jordan High School. Terry Sanford finished with 110 points, Jordan 510 and Leesville 290. Jordan High School qualified for the playoffs with an automatic bid for finishing in first place. Leesville will have to wait and hope to advance with a wild card bid.
Maggie Zargo, a sophomore, sees a glimer of hope for Leesville. “If we came in second place, depending on how many points the other teams earned, there is a possibility we can move on to the next round.”
In round one, pop-up culture, teams were asked questions pertaining to movies, tv, Internet, music, sports and games. All three schools grabbed 60 points each. However, in round two, brain game headliners, Jordan ran away with the competition, answering 80% of the questions and scoring 160 points.
“There was this one kid, Ivan, on the Jordan team, he was the equivalent of a ball hog in basketball,” said Zargo. “He did a lot more than we did and was quicker to the buzzer. They blew us out of the water [in the second round].”
For the rest of the seven rounds, all three teams were nearly evenly matched. Leesville made a slight run in the final two rounds. The Globetrotting round had questions related to San Juan, Samoa, and Mauritius, and the Across America round had questions related to Hawaii, Wyoming and Illinois.
“At one point we were doing really well, and it looked like we might come out on top, but then Jordan High School took the lead and managed to keep it until the end,” said Zargo.
Leesville will find out whether or not they advance later this month. The competition will air sometime in February.
I think math competitions are amazing.