The annual College Bowl Tournament, sponsored by the Union Programming Council’s Ideas and Issues committee, gave the participating teams a chance to compete for the title of LSU’s 2003 College Quiz Bowl Tournament winners.
Tournament winners from the LSU College Bowl squad will travel to the regional competition where they will compete for a chance to attend the national competition and be awarded the title of National College Bowl champions.
The first place winner of the LSU College Bowl Tournament was the Kirby Kraniums team; second place went to Bueller … Bueller … Ferris Bueller? and third place winners were The Stones.
UPC Program Coordinator Jason Meier said the winners of college bowl and the top scoring competitors combine and form the LSU College Bowl Squad, which will practice together and be coached by Tim Louwers.
In February, five members of the team will represent LSU at the Association of College Unions International Region 12 College Bowl Tournament.
Meier said each section of the United States is divided into 15 regions.
Texas, Louisiana, Arkansas and New Mexico form the 12th region.
“There were no competing schools from New Mexico in the competition last year,” Meier said. “But 16 teams from Texas, Louisiana and Arkansas competed.”
Meier said the winners of the regional competition are sent to the national competition where they compete for prize money that can be used to finance the school’s UPC events.
Last year LSU placed second in the regional competition. The University of Arkansas took first and traveled to the National College Bowl Tournament at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia.
Meier said the College Bowl Tournament is a question and answer game played between two teams composed of four players each.
Meier said the questions came from a variety of categories like literature, current events, pop culture, sports and religion.
“The questions are created and sent to us by College Bowl Incorporated,” he said. “Every competing school in the nation is using the same questions in their competition.”
The SPASS, Kirby Kraniums, Wingin’ It, JUMAS, Army of Darkness, The Stones, and Bueller … Bueller … Ferris Bueller? were the seven teams vying for the title of College Bowl champions.
The members of Bueller … Bueller … Ferris Bueller? were on the same Quiz Bowl team in high school and decided to reform as a team at the College Quiz Bowl level.
Team member Winship Songy, a political science junior, said his team competed in the tournament for fun.
“We’re here to have fun,” he said. “We just show up and answer questions.”
Songy said that while some teams spent a lot of time studying and preparing for the tournament, his did not.
“We didn’t practice, but we did watch Jeopardy,” he said. “Jeopardy is a good tutor for the competition.”
Team member Charles Barrett, a biological sciences junior, said his team won its first match, and he was optimistic about its performance in the day’s events.
“We work well together as a team because we each have strong points to contribute to the team,” he said.
Meier said that originally 13 teams signed up to compete in the competition.
“That was back in September,” Meier said. “However, we were experiencing some technical difficulties, and the competition had to be postponed to a later date, and some teams were no longer able to compete.”
Meier said College Bowl Inc. had not sent the questions in time for the initial College Bowl date so the event had to move to an open weekend.
This year the National College Bowl will be hosted by Auburn University-Montgomery in Montgomery, Ala.
Collegebowl.com said the University of Chicago won first place and earned a $10,000 grant from Ford Motor Company.