A lack of speed and an inability to anticipate questions as quickly as some of their opponents cost the Science Bowl team a chance to win the regional championship at the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center. The Falcon A team finished the Feb. 8 competition in fifth place, ending their season and ensuring that they will not advance to the national competition.
“We definitely would have liked to place better, but we were pretty happy with our speed and knowledge,” junior co-captain Max Rombakh said. “One thing that we definitely have to work on is our ability to predict the questions in order to get faster.”
Originally, the school was meant to send two teams; however, due to the large number of participants, only two of the 28 participating schools were able to send two teams. The opportunity was decided by a chance lottery, and Saratoga did not win.
That meant only the top team, Team A, was selected to go. This group included co-captain senior Skyler Mao, Rombakh, and juniors Alex Ge, Warren Chee and Ethan Pan. After winning regionals in 2023, the team hoped to perform just as well this year. They started off strong in the round robin bracket, securing second place and losing only to Lynbrook. Despite finishing fifth, they still managed to move on to the elimination round where they beat El Camino and then lost to Homestead, securing fifth place overall. Although the Falcons’ results were not as good as last year, there were still many key takeaways from this competition.
In order to improve their speed, Rombakh plans on changing their practice so that the number of points given are based on a more subjective interpretation of how well they predicted the question rather than the question type. Doing this encourages the team to start guessing more, developing their ability to predict the question and thereby buzz in faster. Although speed is a main focus of improvement, the team is also focused on training underclassmen and developing their skills.
“Science Bowl has meant a lot to me throughout my four years in high school,” Mao said. “I’ve learned so much and had a lot of fun competing with the team. As a senior, it’s honestly bittersweet to say goodbye.”
