The Scholars Bowl team won the state championship Saturday after a quadruple-tiebreaker thriller to complete the three-peat.
“To be honest, it was very nerve-racking,” senior Ben Pierron said, “but I had confidence in my team members and our abilities.”
Pierron was one of three seniors on the team this season along with Colton Jenkins and Eugene White. Junior Evey Steele and sophomore Leah Barnhart rounded out the team. Junior Wyatt Boose attended as an alternate.
The team entered the tournament after finishing second in the Frontier League championship the previous week. The Cardinals had their work cut out for them in the first two rounds of pool play.
“It was definitely a slow start, but our first two matches we played the two regional champions,” coach Jim Barnard said. “We won one and lost one, but the one we lost was only by 10 points.”
The Cardinals started 1-2 in pool play after a third-round loss to McPherson. But the team remained focused.
“The goal was really, like, to get to four wins because if you get to four wins, then you are likely to get to the finals,” Barnard said. “We knew there was still time to get to that point. So nothing to panic about right away.”
After the tough start, the Cardinals rattled off four consecutive wins to end pool play with a 5-2 record and reach the finals.
After breezing through the semi-finals with a 90-20 win over Pratt, Eudora matched up with Buhler in the state finals.
This ended up being Eudora’s most tightly contested match. The Cardinals and Buhler were stuck in a 45-45 stalemate that took four tiebreaker questions to break.
Buhler was able to buzz-in and answer the last question before Eudora, but didn’t get the correct answer. On the rebound question, Steele iced the match to bring home the state championship.
“As soon as he answered it wrong, I knew,” Steele said.
Reaching the mountaintop was nothing White was not used to. This was his third state championship, being the only member of the team to compete in all three. But he felt this year there was something different.
“This year it’s definitely been the best team I’ve ever been on,” White said. “I’ve been on our team all three years, and it’s really exciting to end on the good note.”
Reach Trey Myers at [email protected].
