With two Scholars Bowls in the same week, the OHS Scholars Bowl Team wrapped up their regular season competitions, The team competed in ten Varsity Scholars Bowl and two Junior Varsity events this season which began in late October. The Varsity was scheduled to be part of an eleventh Scholars Bowl in December but had to cancel due to lack of a team. It has been challenging this season to get five team members to make each contest due to their busy schedules. Scholars Bowl team members tend to be the students at OHS who are involved in multiple activities. Case in point is the trip to Phillipsburg Monday, January 27, to compete in the Phillipsburg invitational Varsity Scholars Bowl. Just Seniors Clay Guttery, and Wyat Wilson with Junior Mary Carlin were able to attend. These three musketeers were able to out score four of their nine competitors. Wyatt had a good evening as there were a number of questions about Marvel Comics and movies which he has a good repertoire of. Clay answered 340 points worth of questions and Mary scored as well but alas three on the team just wasn't enough to medal.
January 29, the last regular Scholars Bowl of the season, hosted by Pike Valley was the NPL League Scholars Bowl. The NPL likes this Scholars Bowl to occur at 1:00 in the afternoon on the last Wednesday of January. All the league schools were present for this rivalry. With the teams divided up into two pools there were only five regular rounds of competition. Senior Grace William was planning to compete but an illness decided otherwise. With Clay Guttery filling in for Grace, the OHS team was comprised of five gladiators. being Senior Kate Kendig, Juniors Mary Carlin and Annie Kendig along with Freshman Camrun Taylor. This team won their first four regular rounds losing only one which put them in first place in their pool. The top two teams in each pool went on to compete in three final rounds in a round robin format. Osborne defeated Sylvan-Lucas in an exciting first final round. The second final round was against Lincoln who the Osborne team had bested by 60 points in their regular round meeting. Alas in this head to head Lincoln won by twenty-five points. Which is the nature of Scholars Bowl. Just because you outscored a team once doesn't mean it will happen twice. The final, final round was against St. John's who over the years Osborne has only won against a handful of times. It was a back and forth exciting event. St. John's answered the first question, Oborne the second, St. John's scored on the third question and Osborne the fourth. Osborne scored on the sixth question, taking the lead. Mid way through the round St. John's got four questions answered, giving them the lead but the round wasn't over, Osborne correctly buzzed in on the last two questions of the round. At the end of this high stakes round Osborne had earned fifty points to St. John's 60. It was a fun round to watch. The Osborne team ended the day with the third-place medal, Lincoln second, and St. John's took home the gold. We thank Pike Valley for hosting this final regular season competition.
With the regular season concluded the teams now looks forward to the KSHSAA Regional, which will be hosted by Ellis. This will occur Thursday, February, 6 at 4:00 pm. Only five team members and one alternate are invited to the Regional. The names of the competitors for each school had to be submitted by Friday, January 31. Hopefully, schedules and health will make it possible for the six to go. The nature of a Regional of course is to narrow down who will get to compete at the KSHSAA State competition. Thirteen teams are to compete at the Ellis site and of those three go on to State. In 2023, the Osborne team won their Regional. We will see what happens in 2025. Go Dogs!!
Submitted by G. Rush - OHS sponsor.