Words: Vaishnavi Mahalingam
On Sunday, October 18, Centennial’s It’s Academic Club sent nine teams to the Blake Academic tournament. The tournament, which took place in Montgomery County, had a total of 30 teams competing. The Centennial A team, comprised of Kevin Costello, Jason Li, Siri Neerchal, and captain Gary Tse, went undefeated in nine games. This is the fourth consecutive year the team has won the tournament. The runner-up was Centennial’s B team, including Christopher Cha, Pranav Ganapathy, Yashas Loves, and captain Aniruddha Rao. The B team had a winning streak until it lost to Centennial’s A team in the finals.
Centennial’s C team, composed of Steen Alme, Jakob Boeye, Rohan Laljani, and captain Sahil Saini made it to round eight in the playoffs. Centennial’s D team, which included William He, Bryce Plunkett, and co-captains Fayyaz Zaidi and Aidan Newell, went undefeated until the quarter finals, and came in 4th place overall.
Last week on Saturday, October 10, the club sent four teams to the University of Maryland tournament. The teams came fifth and sixth place out of 21 competing groups, and were prolific enough to qualify their A and B teams for the PACE national tournament, which will held in Chicago in June. At the tournament, senior Gary Tse, junior Siri Neerchal, sophomores Steen Alme, Jakob Boeye, and Bryce Plunkett, and freshman Steppan Konoplev delivered outstanding performances.
The team’s performance in the tournament next weekend will be shown on TV.
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