By Angelita Faller
GRAMBLING, LA – It was a long, hard fought road to the Honda Campus All-Star Challenge (HCASC) National Tournament for Grambling State University’s Quiz Bowl Team, but the season has come to an end with the team advancing as far as the Sweet 16 and winning a $6,000 grant in the national tournament held March 21-25 in Torrance, Calif.
Grambling’s team made it to the playoffs, but lost 380-490 against Norfolk State University in the team’s final match. Norfolk State advanced to the Final Four, where they lost against Prairie View A&M University, which won the national tournament and a $50,000 prize.
Team Captain Dave Fields said it was a tough loss for the team, especially knowing that Grambling had previously beaten the new national champions, Prairie View, during the National Qualifying Tournament on Jan. 31.
“I’m happy that we once again made it this far, but I feel like we could have gone a lot farther. We are a really good team, and the team that won it all [Prairie View], we beat them earlier in the year during the regional tournament. Knowing that our team was successful against them earlier, it was tough,” Fields said.
During the HCASC, each of the 48 teams that qualified for the national tournament was divided into eight divisions of six teams each. After each team plays all the other teams in their division, the top two teams from each division advance to the Sweet 16 playoffs.
Going into the first round of national tournament play, Fields realized that Hampton University and Alabama State University were Grambling’s biggest rivals to advance to the playoffs. Grambling suffered a close defeat, 440-465, against Hampton University in its first match.
After that loss, Grambling won its next three matches against Shaw University (530-230), Southern University at New Orleans (490-290) and North Carolina A&T State University (465-225). In the team’s fifth match, Grambling faced a challenging round against Alabama State University, which was undefeated after four rounds.
“Hampton University had beaten us earlier, so we had to beat all the other teams to make it out of the division. So we either had to beat Alabama State, or we wouldn’t make it out of the room,” Fields said.
The Tigers rallied for a win over Alabama 510-460. This year marks the 25th year Grambling has competed in the HCASC, and Grambling’s quiz bowl teams have qualified for the national championship tournament 16 times.
The members of the GSU Quiz Bowl Team who competed in the 2015 national tournament are Whitney Gaston-Loyd, a senior from Shreveport, La., John Carter, a freshman from Washington, N.C., Jharrayne McKnight, a junior from Anacoco, La., and Captain Fields, a junior from Miliani, Hawaii. The team is advised by Charlette Favors, director of student organizations, and Juanita Bobo, a counselor.
“Our 2015 season, overall, was very successful as we won the regional tournament at Prairie View A&M University where we beat this year’s national champion, Prairie View A&M University. Our record at nationals was four wins and one loss as we defeated the only unbeaten team in our division to win a place in the final 16. All in all, it was a great year, and now we have begun to critique our game in order to improve for next year,” Favors said.
Now that the season has ended, Favors and Fields are hoping to start a class next year to recruit new team members and help prepare members of the quiz bowl team for the specialized knowledge they need for the national tournaments. HCASC teams are often questioned on history, popular culture, geography, literature, mythology and Black history.
For more information about Grambling’s Quiz Bowl team, contact Favors at favorsc@gram.edu. For more information about HCASC, visit www.hcasc.com.
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