UKAT 2005-2006 ACF

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Heinrich Bowl at Georgia Tech, "Madder than Mad Jack McMad, Winner of Last Year's Mr. Madman Competition"
Player Games Tossups Interrupts TU/I PPG
Seth 10 121 10 12.10 116.00


Ahh, the annual Heinrich Bowl, where some combination of incompetence, unforeseen personal disaster, uncontrollable external difficulties, and plain bad luck almost inevitably results in a debacle just short of the level of, say, any Italian military operation of the last 300 years. Few tournaments on the Fall slate along with Seth's uncharacteristic optimism that each year's incarnation will be better than the previous year's has hitherto justified the UKAT's continued presence at this event, and saw to it that the team faithfully appeared at this one, too, though unlike in ages past it fielded only one squad this time which consisted solely of Seth himself. To Tech's credit, this season's actually was an improvement over that of 2004: in particular, the reading was largely competent and the tournament moved quickly, such that a tournament whose play began at 9:45 and included an hour for lunch managed to end after ten rounds at 5:00 PM, with playoffs concluded by 6:00. On the other hand, the field was small (six teams, which led to a double round-robin), the stats were infrequently posted, and the packets ranged from the fairly decent (one of Webb's rounds and a guest packet from Jerry Vinokurov) to the abominable (Harvard's round stands out in this regard) and were of inconsistent difficulty. At the end of an up-and-down day Seth - playing under a team name taken from a line from the third season of BlackAdder - went 9-1, having split its games with a rising power that is Florida State, to whom he lost in the playoff to take second place (congratulations to FSU for what was mostly a dominating performance). Sigh. Still, there are probably worst things than coming in as runner-up (finishing lower than that, for example), and Seth was able to draw whatever shallow comfort could be gotten from having his career-best tournament average (116 ppg, enough for MVP) and a career-high 17-0 game against FSU B (though apparently he managed better even than that; see below; and the final verdict is that, all told, the tournament was adequate enough not to lead to regrets at having attended, so here you have it.

UPDATE: According to the game-by-game breakdown of the event's personal statistics posted by the Georgia Tech team (which may be found here), the Heinrich Bowl apparently had a couple of historically interesting points for the UKAT's archive of personal accomplishments. In the first place, it states that Seth managed to go 18-0 against Berry, which would thus qualify for his best game ever and tie the record set by Kelly (who went 18-0 against Athens State at the 2004 ACF Regionals); that Berry game was somewhat controversial in its conduct, but for a variety of reasons it still counts, so Seth's best game was even better, in a sense. Secondly, according to he team detail Seth also managed to go 8 - 8 (!!!!!) in the second FSU A game, which also ties an individual ACF record of 8 interrupts in a game, again set by Kelly (against a hybrid team at the 2000 WSTLU's KICK-ASS tournament); finally, Seth's 116 ppg ties him with Kelly for the highest individual ppg at a tournament (actually, Kelly averaged .25 ppg higher at the 2003 Heinrich Bowl, so he remains slightly superior, as is fitting). So, for those who really care about the intricacies of the UKAT's Hall of Records, this tournament was one for the books, all right.


Center of the Known Universe VIII at UT-Chattanooga, "So I pranked him ... to death with a tire-iron"
Player Games Tossups Interrupts TU/I PPG
Seth 10 106 10 10.60 101.00


Center of the Known Universe VIII at UT-Chattanooga, "What Happens When Women Pray"
Player Games Tossups Interrupts TU/I PPG
Will 10 40 5 8.00 37.50
Gerald 10 17 8 2.13 13.00


Center of the Known Universe VIII at UT-Chattanooga, "Diptheric Bullet-holes"
Player Games Tossups Interrupts TU/I PPG
Ryan 8 38 10 3.80 41.25
Kalan 8 15 3 5.00 16.88
Hunter 8 6 2 3.00 6.25


UT-C's annual Center of the Known Universe tournament has come to be associated with many traditions observed by the UKAT, which has fielded at least one team to every year's incarnation. There is, for example, the traditional collegiate debut of the team's new members (in this case the C team's Kalan and Hunter, who kept it real with Ryan in Division II), typically coming after the traditional massive drinking done the night before, and this bacchanal itself often plays no small part in the traditional loss of the tournament (the team has never won it, having come closest to so doing waaaaaay back at the first one in 1998). Hardly ones to part with custom, the squad dutifully got hammered Friday night and then fielded three teams the next day: "Diptheric Bullet-Holes" (the "C" team taking its name from speculation as to the new decorations adorning Hunter's favorite bookstore in New Orleans) finished fifth in its bracket after a few narrow losses and just missed the playoffs in Division II; "What Happens When Women Pray" (the "B" team of Gerald and Will) lost many more close games, racked up a 1-8 record, and sunk to the bottom of the Div. 1 field, while Seth, playing under the name "So I pranked him ... to death with a tire-iron" (taken from a line uttered by our next President on an SNL sketch) came in third overall behind Florida State and tournament-victors Vanderbilt (congratulations to them). Another bull's-eye for the Captains of Competence. Still, amidst the lowlights there were some high points, such as Will's inspired answer of "acetone" for "acetylene" even after the word "torch" had been read (his inimitable logic was "Well, both will remove nail polish", which is technically true), more solid play from Ryan (who earned an all-star for his efforts), decent play from Seth (who netted an MVP for his endeavors), as well as spectacular showing from the Commonwealth as a whole: both Louisville and Georgetown were there at their first ACF tournament, and not only did both make the Div. II playoffs, but Georgetown even won it all (congratulations to them). Perhaps this can be parleyed into future cross-town practices. Either way, a decent time was had even as the UKAT bungled yet another COTKU, but I suppose we would hardly have it any other way.


Illinois Open: Spite, Death, and the Devil at Urbana Champaign, "Let the Gravitas Begin"
Player Games Tossups Interrupts TU/I PPG
Seth 10 69 7 9.86 65.50
Ryan 10 8 5 1.60 5.50
Hunter 10 2 0 N/A 2.00
Gerald 10 1 1 1.00 0.50


Seth's steadily declining interest in the game and the relative inexperience of Hunter and Ryan would seem to suggest that the Illinois Open - easily the most hardcore tournament of the Fall semester and possibly of the entire regular season save Nationals - should have been an unlikely venue at which UKAT might field a team. Nevertheless, enticed by the fact that Seth Teitler's myth tournament was to be played afterward (more directly) and emboldened by some magic recreational herbs experienced the evening before, the team - playing as "Let the Gravitas Begin", from a line uttered in the inaugural episode of one of the most excellent shows ever and a suitable name for a team consisting of two classics majors and one Roman History graduate student - ended up making an appearance after all, and did battle with some of the best in the game on questions which were hard but in the end still pretty accessible. When the dust settled, ten rounds of less-than-excellent play led to a ho-hum 6-4 record which was good for fifth place, while Seth took second in scoring. A fairly good tournament, all told; the consensus amongst the UKAT was that it was worth attending, so there you have it.

Following the IO, the UKAT's members competed in "Myth Singles 1: Tlazolteotl Chows Down", a mythology singles tournament written by Seth Teitler, almost certainly the best myth writer and perhaps the best myth player in the game. Gerald, Ryan, and Hunter finished 8th, 11th, and 13th, respectively, whilst Seth navigated a minefield of many excellent myth players and went undefeated, narrowly hedging out the superb Susan Ferrarri in the overtime of the playoff game to take the title. Teitler more than earned the encomia with which he has been inundated for his masterful question set, and it is hoped that sometime in the future someone else can take over the writing duties to allow Teitler himself to play againt Kendall, Ferrarri, and other great myth scorers (like Matt Weiner, for example) for a full-fledged myth showdown.


ACF Fall at UT-Knoxville, "I am going to beat you until you are dead"
Player Games Tossups Interrupts TU/I PPG
Seth 10 129 16 8.06 121.00


ACF Fall at UT-Knoxville, "Female Economists of the Early Ottoman Empire"
Player Games Tossups Interrupts TU/I PPG
Ryan 10 41 10 4.10 36.00
Will 10 26 3 8.67 24.50
Gerald 10 16 7 2.29 12.50
Hunter 10 8 2 4.00 7.00


In looking at the roster of editors for this year's Fall, which was manned by the most avid of hard-line ACF partisans, it is understandable that there was a certain amount of trepidation about the tournament's ability to maintain the tradition of being the most accessible of the year. However, this year's set was a worthy successor to years past, and on questions which were purely academic, pyramidal, and yet all-in-all firmly canonical, the UKAT's teams did very well; the B team - playing under a name inspired by a facetious characterization of the sort of bonus to be heard at the Illinois Open from a ... disadvantaged team there - rode a 9-5 record (which included two very narrow losses to Kentucky's "A" team and a playoff win over third-place team Georgia Tech) to fourth place largely on the formidable buzzing of Ryan, whose fearlessness is indicated by his 10 interrupts in ten games, the third-highest neg total. On the other side, a one-man team of Seth - playing as "I am going to beat you until you are dead", from a GREAT review of R. Kelly's "Trapped in a Closet" - won two narrow victories over Kentucky B, incurred one win and one last-tossup loss to Georgia Tech A, and was victim of two bone-crushing defeats by eventual tournament-winners Vanderbilt A (congratulations to them) to finish second place, a disappointment for which a douceur does exist in the form of his MVP-earning 121 points per game, his career highest (he would also lead the field in interrupts with 16 in ten games). Other than that, highlights exist in the form of the excellent questions (every competitor in the field answered at least one tossup), in the surprisingly great competition, in getting to hang out with the luscious Monica Marks, Louisville's heavy artillerist (a sophomore who, in only her second ACF tournament ever, was second in the field in scoring, going 62-3 for close to 61 points per game and a TUI of 20.67), and in the second-ever appearance of the Grail in the form of Kentucky A's 20-0 game against UT-B (which, if any more were needed, is a further testament to the excellence of the questions; it should be noted that the first Grail, won by Illinois A three years ago, was also at an ACF Fall). A fine tournament, for which all the teams who competed and the editors who produced it should have a great deal of pride.


Princeton Annual Regional Fall Academic Invitational Tournament at Princeton, "Rebel Without Applause"
Player Games Tossups Interrupts TU/I PPG
Seth 8 94 5 18.80 114.38


An unexpected windfall of available time and plane fare allowed the UKAT to field a "team" consisting only of Seth Kendall (playing as "Rebel Without Applause", a suitable appellation for a Southerner in New Jersey known for his inability to close the deal on tournaments) at Princeton's newly-renamed PARFAIT, where it was hoped the mettle of the New England circuit's teams could be tested. Sadly, powerhouse teams like Harvard, Yale, and Brown elected not to attend - their reasoning was apparently that a three-hour trip was "too far", which received little sympathy from a representative of a team whose closest tournament is four hours away - and in a somewhat weakened field Seth managed to finish second, losing to Rutgers-New Brunswick on the last tossup of the finals (congratulations to them). Damn it. Still, it was overall a pretty fair tournament: logistics were smooth, the reading was mostly excellent, and if the packets had flaws (such as repeats) they were still playable and academic, enabling Seth to hedge out Rutgers's Jason Keller for MVP. Thanks are in order to Princeton (who were extremely accomodating and extremely pleasant folks), to the teams there for making an outside feel welcome, and to the Rutgers squad, who in addition to playing well also generously transported Seth to and from the tournament and even treated him to dinner afterwards.


Sword Bowl at University of Tennessee-Chattanooga, "Pull the Strings!"
Player Games Tossups Interrupts TU/I PPG
Seth 9 111 7 15.86 119.44


In private conversations with the editor of this much-derided tournament long before it took place, it was explained to Seth that a "senior division" would be created at it for the first time but that it would nevertheless remain primarily what Sword Bowl had always been: a mid-year introductory tournament for novices. The tossups, then, would not be structured such as they were at ACF Fall, which surpassed all expectations in being accessible but still providing new and interesting clues to supplement the old standard clues for gettable answers; rather, they would lead in with those stock clues, because many of the players would not know them. For veterans and antiquities like Seth, then, it would be a fast, fast tournament: the answer was going to be pretty much exactly what one expeced it would be every time, and the path to get to it would use all the baseline facts which have become so familiar that they are nearly giveaways for the experienced but had not yet been absorbed and internalized by the novices, for whom the tournament was designed.

Having thus been warned, the UKAT then was able to field a "team" consisting of Seth, who thus had a pretty good idea of what to expect and thus was not surprised when the questions turned out to be exactly as it had been intimated they would be. Nor was he surprised when the tournament turned out to be a pretty good time, all told; that the other teams in the field seemed to enjoy it; that no one complained about the level of difficulty; and, alas, that it was subsequently savaged by the internet community at large. At any rate, Seth and the rest of the field enjoyed themselves, though there were lowlights overall in the higher-than-optimal number of repeats, and lowlights for the UKAT particularly in the form of a horrible game against Vanderbilt, who steamrolled through Seth en route to the win (congratulations to them). On the other hand, highlights include old pal and former UKAT star Chad Money making at appearance on a master's team (and leading the "Masters division" in scoring), more excellent play and just excellence from Louisville's Monica Marks, and Seth's MVP. A good time, then; yeah.


ACF Southeast Regional at UT-Chattanooga, "I am Jack's Complete Lack of Surprise"
Player Games Tossups Interrupts TU/I PPG
Seth 11 121 11 11.00 105.00


In years past ACF Regionals was the tournament to attend for the acquisition of ACF in what is close to its ideal form, and for that reason was always the UKAT's favorite event (pace the Fall, which was also great fun): thoroughly academic but deeper than the more novice-friendly Fall, more challenging for the purists but not so out of balance as to be inaccessible as Nationals has been, it seems to have been tailor-made for experienced teams on the make but nevertheless still attractive even for those not yet at the elite plateau. This year's Regionals was no exception; in fact, it was almost nondescript in its homogeneneous excellence, with no particular packet standing out as too difficult, no obvious hoses, and indeed nothing that drew attention to the questions in a negative way and thus distract from the playing of the games themselves. At such an event, the UKAT (represented by Seth, who was not optimistic about pulling off a repeat of last year's performance) played well but ended by losing to the superior Vanderbilt team, which is is just as it should be (congratulation to them for the win), though Seth did manage to rope in a scoring MVP for his pains. In sum, another fine Regionals.


Commodore Classic at Vanderbilt, Kentucky A "I find your lack of faith disturbing"
Player Games Tossups Interrupts TU/I PPG
Seth 10 110 5 22.00 107.50


Commodore Classic at Vanderbilt, Kentucky B
Player Games Tossups Interrupts TU/I PPG
Ryan 10 36 14 2.57 29.00
Hunter 10 14 4 3.50 12.00


A thoroughly rusty team plus packets which were sure to be very difficult is ordinarily the recipe for a perfect disaster for the UKAT, but in a long dry spell of ACF tournaments it was decided to give this one a go and as a result it was able to field two teams for Vanderbilt's mirror of the Matt Weiner-Dan Passner Wirt Invitational. Premonitions about difficulty were, it appears, not unwarranted, as the consensus was that the tournament was very hard, but nevertheless both Kentucky teams ended up in the playoffs, where the Hunter and Ryan Express was stopped short by Louisville from making their run at second place and ended up tied for third. In the meantime Seth, whose own personally trying week and inability to concentrate seems to have proved beneficial, somehow was able to jar the cosmos and temporarily leave his accustomed second place enough to win the tournament, simultaneously leading it in scoring (Ryan also got a scoring award). All in all a fun enough tournament, made the moreso by getting to hangout with friends like Bigg Bill Beyer of FSU and the always-delicious Monica from Louisville and making new pals from the Washington University crew; good times, good times.


Moon Pie Classic at UT-Chattanooga, "Ain't gonna paddle it - gonna kick it, real hard"
Player Games Tossups Interrupts TU/I PPG
Seth 12 120 18 6.67 92.50


The word "incompetent" is a fairly strong adjective when used to describe a tournament performance, but in reference to the "play" at this year's Moon Pie it is fitting in the sense that English lacks a proper term to describe the unique blend of "terrible", "atrocious", "inept" and "turbo-suck" that would be more suitable. Under such linguistic constraints, then, suffice it to say that the UKAT - Seth by himself again- was mauled by the field (and by himself at the same time; his 18 interrupts is his career tournament high for that statistic) to finish 8-4, "good" for fourth place amoung non-Masters teams. Lowlights were everywhere - the round four loss to Virginia Tech was a real masterpiece, and an ugly incident with one of the teams there did much to sully the day - but highlights still exist: these take the form of narrowly edging out Borglum for tournament MVP, and indeed getting to hang out with him and lose to him in a game in which each player went 9-2; another opportunity to see the excellent J.R. and the South Carolina crew; a pretty close win over eventual tournament-winner Florida State (congratulations to them for their victory); and a touching send-off game to pal Stephen Webb in what he claims is his last official collegiate tournament. So, hardly the best UKAT Moon Pie, but it is deep enough, it will serve. On to the summer ...