The following recollections were written by Jesse Wagner of the national championship team from Owasso, OK.
Round 7 against Grand Island was a tough match. They played us very well and theirfirst two chairs kept on making some amazing hits. It was close for a while into the match, but at the end we pulled out the victory.
The match against Bothell was absolutely crazy. We came out hot, I had a great hit on question 2, and we go up 50-0. As the match progressed, they came back and by question 13 I think, they were up 140-75. Josh had made a couple of key mistakes as he sent back two rereads because of easy quotes that he missed. We dug in our heels and didn’t give up even though we were down by quite a bit. Jenna-Jo hit the last 30 pointer of the match and got it wrong. Daniel took the reread for the quizout. After that Josh hit a quote after already two quotes wrong that match. But this time he nailed it. And on question nineteen Josh made a great hit and quizzed out, sealing the victory. It was an incredibly well fought game on both sides, and definitely one that I will always remember.
Round 12 against James River was our only loss. It was pretty close, but Josh and I each sent a 30 pointer back to them as a reread, and that hurt us. I made a very stupid mistake on my thirty, and it really cost us big. Blake quizzed out with a high point total, and Colin sealed it on question 18 or 19. It was a devestating blow as I had aspirations of going undefeated again. But I picked myself back up and the next game I quizzed out after question 7 against Santa Ana. The round after that we played Orlando and got a triple quizout.
Round 18 against garfield was close. I made a dumb mistake on a thirty. After giving four of the five versses for Satan, I go into 8:34 for the fifth verse instead of 8:33. It was a bad mental mistake that nearly cost us. But thankfully we pulled it out in the end. The last round against O’Fallon we came out strong. I knew if we won that we had Nationals. We all quizzed really well, and had a commanding lead the whole game. After we clinched it for sure we called a time out and we were so overjoyed. It was a great Nationals.
After winning last year, I had such a strong passion to win it again and after we clinched it in the final round, I felt so incredibly happy. My brothers and I were all crying after the match, it was a real special win for us. I had worked so hard this whole year, a whole lot harder than last year, and I knew that a lot of other top teams had as well, and the competition level this year was extremely high. We knew we had to step up our game this year, and we did, especially Josh and myself. Last year Daniel really had the concordance mastered, but this year all three of us knew everything there was to know, and we were extremely well prepared. My hat is off to a lot of the teams and individuals this year, but especially to the team of Bothell, Washington. I have so much respect for their team and coaching staff, and they have continually proven to be quizzing at the highest level and achieving success. Their dynasty is one that is hard to match, and not only are they all phenomenal quizzers and excellent coaches, but they have such great attitudes and are all just great people. This year we had our ups and our downs at lots of tournaments, and I felt like we had under-achieved at a few of the tournaments, but at Nationals it all came together, and I can’t thank my family enough as they quizzed and coached alongside me. And most importantly God, who enabled me to have success. I had such an awesome and fun year in quiz and I can’t wait for another great quiz season next year!