The Manhattan High Scholars Bowl team went to Flint Hills Christian School to compete last Saturday, placing second overall, nearly going undefeated except for one loss to Flint Hills Christian School. 

The team was really proud of their success at this meet and thought it went well for it being a Saturday tournament, which is rather unusual for the team.

“I think it went well. We dominated the entire meet, but we were shocked by FHCS,” senior Josh Brandt said.

In general many of the team members thought it went well. 

“I thought the meet went well for us. We ended up going 7-1 and in second place,” senior Brian Dudley said.

They were proud of each other as well.

“I was proud of the boys that went,” Brandt said.

The Saturday meet was different from what the team is used to. They don’t usually go to Saturday meets, but this one was an exception.

“It’s an oddity for us. I usually steer away from Saturday meets,” Ted Dawdy, Scholars Bowl coach, said. “When they moved it, I asked the kids and they said they were willing to go. So here we are.”

Dawdy expected nothing less, as they typically do really well at this tournament. 

“I’ll have some, uh, several of my number one guys with me tomorrow, Josh Brandt, Allen Zhang, Brian Dudley. So like I said, you know, we’re pretty, we’re taking a pretty strong team,” Dawdy said. “Allen Zhang ended up leading the way, scoring-wise.”

The team practices for these tournaments by having weekly practices every Monday and Tuesday, holding in-class competitions against each other, going through rounds of questions. Over break, when they can’t meet up, they have to find other ways to study.

“Over the break, the best way to stay fresh is to read a lot of books. A lot of the questions they ask are either things they teach in class or they’re things you read in books,” Brandt said. 

They tend to not use books when in practices, but sometimes they do resort to them when in need of studying for meets.

“It is harder to study for from books,” Dudley said. “Over breaks we may have to resort to using those books and the internet to study.”

The team communicated really well, and together strived for the win. There were very few mistakes made and there weren’t many questions they left on the table through mistakes. 

“I can’t wait for our next meet,” Brandt said.