I am calling
Copley to win OAC State. This is a _great_ field, but I think Copley separates themselves from the pack for several reasons (and no, being treated to the wonderful readers' buffet there did not influence my decision
.)
Beavercreek is a very fine team; of all the teams participating, I am postulating they are the strongest across measures of PPB and powers. However, this is Beavercreek's first time at OAC States in a minute. Hari is an incredible player, and his accomplishments and improvement is especially noteworthy since he's only a sophomore, but I'm inclined to think (from my experiences playing OAC at regionals and states) that balance, particularly in a format that allows for conferral, prevails.
Copley, from my observation of reading them and reading stat breakdowns, is the most balanced team in this field. I'm not sure if they're necessarily the
deepest, but they won the Northeast Regional without Kevin (who is a very strong player.) Their specialization in categories makes for their players to be really concentrated on the topics they have to care about, which makes for better efficiency in terms of tossups heard/answered correctly per player. Additionally, Copley is by far the most tradition rich team in this field when it comes to OAC; that's their bread and butter, and, coupled with pretty good pyramidal experience and performance, the ability to confer and work together I feel makes Copley a legitimate threat in this tourney to win it all.
I think the top two in this tournament will be Beavercreek and Copley. BC, in my opinion, presents the biggest obstacle to the Indians' quest for a seventh OAC State Title. I think while Beavercreek could be the strongest team in this field, there are intangibles such as OAC States experience and balance that I feel pushes Copley above BC.
If FC gets second in the state, that means they pulled a few upsets along the way. Not sure if this is a team really capable of pulling those sorts of upsets given their NAQT States performance. (Not hating on you for the prediction though, Bob. Go Irish!)
Possible draw scenarios, from the perspective of FC (kind of shapes the scenarios for other teams): 40% chance that either Beavercreek or Copley is in FC's morning group; I believe it's a 20% chance that Beavercreek, Copley, and FC are all in the same bracket (unless I did the math wrong, which I probably did.) I think it's also a 40% chance they get Copley and Sidney in their morning draw. I'm not too math-savvy, nor am I too familiar with the combination possibilities (or are they permutations?) that create the draw.
I'm inclined to think Lakewood and Sidney are darkhorses. For the latter, and no disrespect to any of the other seniors in the field, it's obvious that Nour has had an absolutely illustrious four year career as a player, and I think he has the means and drive to turn in a spoiler performance in the morning that can put the Jackets' in the afternoon. As for Lakewood... they were in my room twice yesterday, they were great at fine arts and literature. Solid on history and RMP, and competent at science. I'm not too sure how they will fare on harder material, but they're definitely a team that will pull their fair share of early buzzes and they're definitely not a team you can afford to 'neg' to 2+ times in the final round if you want to beat them.
I'm not too sure what Solon has, as I only read for them once this year, but I'm assuming they have a balanced attack that can pull a 3-2 or a 4-1 in the morning easily. Then there is Aurora, who had the advantage in NC before Solon took them to the second game and won. Obviously, we can't overlook who came out of North Coast, as, to use Tyler's words, that was the region that had "the most teeth, outside of the WC."
I don't want to discount Cloverleaf nor Coach Flint necessarily, but I think they'll need to get a lot of good early buzzes along with good category + alphabet round performances to keep themselves alive for final four contention.
Southwest teams... I think Little Miami and Walnut Hills are long shots to win the entire state, but they can play a spoiler role in the morning, particularly if a team such as FC or Sidney has a bad game. The thing about the SW regional that has always piqued my interest, particularly as it relates to the Regionals competition (and, by extension, the state competition) would be that while there aren't a ton of quiz bowl active schools down there, that regional was chocked full of schools that have great academic reputations, public and private. It definitely means
something to win a regional that has Walnut Hills, St. X, Mason, Sycamore, Wyoming, and Turpin in it, regardless of how often or how little they play the game. That might not be a region where the best teams play of a lot of pyramidal quiz bowl (LM not withstanding), but it is a region where a lot of the teams have huge student populations and plentiful course offerings. Seeing as how the regional set was written, whether by intention or coincidence, in a manner that made classroom material pretty relevant rather than just making it a contest of knowing lists of authors and their works/lists of battles and their wars, I think this is noteworthy.
As much as I would rather not say "northwest has no shot of winning the title", I think this field too deep from all corners of the state for Findlay or Swanton to finish the morning with one loss or less. Both Findlay and Swanton put up 17.xx on IS 159-A, and Swanton is fresh of some good nationals experience, so those squads have that going for them. I just think this is a really tough year for a NW squad to break into the final four.