On October 23, from 9 a.m to 4 p.m, Irvington High’s Quiz Bowl team competed at the 2021 Sacramento Fall Quiz Bowl Tournament. The competition was held online, mainly on Discord, but simulated the properties of an in-person tournament. These included moderators and actual buzzers on Discord, to best suit the players.

IHS Quiz Bowl’s team was 4 members strong, consisting of Skand Parvatikar (12), Ayush Patel (11), Kaiwen Xiao (11), and Michael Zheng (11). Teams were first split up into rooms, and when moderators arrived into respective rooms, the tournament started. Teams were quizzed on questions from all fields of study, including topics like literature, science, etc. The tournament was Round Robin style; the team with the most wins in the tournament placed first, with others following suit. Irvington’s Quiz Bowl team competed valiantly, and their hard work paid off when the team placed 4th out of 15 varsity teams in the tournament, qualifying for NAQT Nationals, which will occur from May 27 to May 29. 

Rounds weren’t without their challenges through the tournament.

“In a particularly close game, I buzzed on a biology question, even though we have a specialized biology member, Ayush,” said Xiao. The team hopes to work out such issues with buzzing in the future, along with more strategizing. “As a team, we could have converted more bonus points, but my teammates did really well,” he stated.

Irvington Quiz Bowl consists of 16 active members in this year’s club, with meetings on Tuesday at lunch, in room 25, Mrs. MJ’s room. They practice for tournaments in numerous ways, mainly simulating the conditions of actual tournaments. These include buzzer practice rounds with all of the club’s active members. Members also read question packets containing questions that could be useful in real tournaments. These methods of practice have evidently paid off.

 “Last year’s Quiz Bowl team placed in the top fifty of Nationals,” said Quiz Bowl President Vincent Wang (11). “In the first semester, tournaments are going to be online, but we’re not sure about the second semester. I think our team is relatively stronger than last year’s, and I’m looking forward to the rest of the season.” 

As this competition marks the first of many, Quiz Bowl is off to a strong start. 

“We feel good, and will continue to go to more tournaments and hold more meetings to practice. We have an Irvington individual tournament on November 18, and our next tournament is California Cup 1, on November 13. Prospective members should try and come to the individual tournament!” said Xiao.