Taking on State

Yesterday was the big day!  After placing 1st in Regionals back in Feburary,  Evan and Stephen's Middle School Academic Team had earned their way to State!  We met at the Middle School parking lot in the morning and then headed to the University of Oklahoma.  Nana, Papa, Aunt Kary, and Emily all came along too.  Grandma and Papa Floyd met up with us on the road on the way there.  We were all ready to cheer on our boys.  We made great time to the campus, which ended up being really good.  OU was playing their annual Red Vs. White football game and there was a big State Debate Tournament being held. Most likely, there were other events going on as well. People were everywhere and parking was limited.  We found a spot in a parking garage and booked it over to the Physical Science Building.  That place was busy!  There were so many teams, parents, grandparents, and directors there.  The State competition was broken down into 4 classes that were determined by school district size.  Even though our town is quite small by many standards, we were placed on the bracket with the bigger schools as the 3rd ranked team.  The first game was played at 10 a.m.  The boys were playing an OKC team.  For this round, we only had 1 seventh grade player.  The rest were in OKC for a band contest and scheduled to arrive as soon as possible.  That put the boys a little on edge, even though I'm not really sure why.  The 6th grade team remained undefeated in our our county league. (Evan was the top scorer too. Woo-woo!) Then, it was go time!  I was surprised by the size of the classroom.  It was tiny!  Jason stayed outside with the girls.  I'm sure they would have been good, but there was no room.  Nana and Aunt Kary had to sit on the floor and they were far from the only ones doing just that.  The boys sat down and did their thing.  During regular rounds, our team was far superior.  In fact, Evan answered a total of 9 questions correctly, while the entire other team combined only answered 11.   Evan can thank his sisters for making him watch Wallykazam now.  That was the answer to one of the questions he got correct. The lightening rounds were a little different.  Our boys picked State Capitols thinking it would be easy.  Only, it wasn't quite the topic they thought it would be.  For example, one of the questions wanted the first name of the man that the capital of Texas was named after - it's Steve Austin. =)  The second lightening round, they picked things that start with the letter "R".  One question was, "Which Book of the Bible is considered the Armageddon book?"  Our boys said "Revelations" and it was counted as wrong.    The correct answer is Revelation.  We all realized that we've been saying it wrong our whole lives. lol! Even with the lightening rounds not going quite as good as we had hoped, we still pulled out a win!  Before we knew it, it was time for the next game.  This time, Nana stayed in the hallway with the girls, so that both Jason and I could watch.  Our extra seventh graders showed up for this round.  They were playing a team that we both won and lost to at Regionals.  The first round was hard fought.  We were up at times.  We were down at times.  Our 7th grade team captain is our spelling guy and on every single spelling question the other team buzzed in before the question was all the way out.  It was tense.  So was the room.  It was standing room only and the air was so thick and humid! Our sub players had to sit on the floor.  By the time of the second round, our team was down.  Then, this happened.

Evan became team captain.  Having my 10 year-old playing captain while sitting at a table of 12 and 13 year-olds made me equally proud and nervous.  That's a lot of pressure for a little guy!  But, he helped lead his team to victory and they won...only by 2 questions, but they won!  We left this game and went directly into the 3rd game.  Grandma stayed in the hallway with the girls this time. I thought it was so nice that Nana and Grandma stayed with the girls for us.  It meant a lot to both Jason and me. This room was packed as well, but it was a bit larger and about 15 degrees cooler.  Evan sat in as captain for part of this round too.  I had every intention to keep score, write everything down, and take loads of pictures, but I just didn't.  Things are fast and intense.  If I tried to keep record of one moment, I might miss the next. In addition, we have to remain silent.  So, I just stayed in the moment for this round.  Our team was playing the first rated team and ended up losing.  It wasn't for lack of knowledge, the other team was amazingly quick on the buzzer.  I will say though, their team had a player that was a force to be reckoned with.  He was good!  Since the tournament was double elimination, our team was guaranteed to play at least one more game. We barely had enough time to eat lunch.  Only, there weren't any places to eat close by.  The boys stayed at the building with their team and our family went to find some food.  Giving up our parking space wasn't an option, so we took to the campus on foot.  Did I mention there were a lot of people there?  The football stadium holds 70,000 spectators.  With all of the events total, I'm sure that there were about 100,000 people on campus. It was madness! Papa was in his element though, as he used to be a season ticket holder and always seems at ease in big crowds.  The rest of us, not so much.  In fact, Papa and Grandma decided to head back to the tournament before we found food. Papa Gene led the way across campus.  I love this picture of Papa and Addi.  It may be one of my most favorite pictures of the two of them ever.

Payton told me to take this picture of the stadium.

We had exactly 55 minutes to get food and get back.  It took us 16 minutes to walk to the first little restaurant that we found.  It was the first time I've ever got lunch from The Einstein Brothers Bagel Company.  It will most likely be the last time too. =)  Paying over $20 for 3 pizza bagels and 2 drinks is just not how I want to spend money.  That being said, they are in a prime location on campus directly across from the football stadium.  I'm sure losing our possibly once a year business won't hurt their bottom line at all. =)  We headed back to the tournament before we ate and that's when we got the call that the coach had made an agreement with the other team to play the game 20 minutes early.  There was no way that we could make it back in time. We were barely going to make it in time to eat and watch in time anyways.  I was pretty bummed.  Since Grandma and Papa Floyd hung back, they got to be there for the boys.  I watched from the door window, while Jason, Aunt Kary, and the girlies ate in the hallway.

When I peaked in, Evan was playing captain again.  I couldn't hear anything, but I could tell by our team's body language that it wasn't going well.  We were bummed that our team lost, but we were excited that we still placed 3rd in our very first State competition.  The team kept is State ranking.

I absolutely cannot tell you how proud I am of these boys!  They did so amazingly well.  They were both upset that they didn't get first.  But, they do get to take this plaque back to hang at their school.  The team will all be presented with medals at a school assembly.  I really wish that the team would get trophies and a big one to take back to their school like sports teams do. We decided to have celebratory custard on the way home!  Aunt Kary designed the super cute "Keep Calm and Buzz In" shirts.  Addi was mad that I didn't order any for the girls.  I'll have to next year.  

Our crew minus Grandma and Papa Floyd.  The headed another direction to visit a relative.

Evan and Papa

It was a really great day and I'm already looking forward to next season!