Now that the season is officially over, I thought we could start discussion on the teams to watch for next year. Here are my early rankings for the 2018-19 Ohio circuit:
TIER I
1. Beavercreek - One of the best players in the nation in Hari Parameswaran is returning, and with support from steadily-improving lit player Abby Cohen and promotions from a strong JV team, the beavers will still contend for a national title even with the losses of David and Ziyi.
2. Miami Valley - John John and William are also improving quickly on an already wide knowledge base, especially in history, geo, myth, and lit. If they can find two more players to complement their strengths, they may not be far behind Beavercreek. They should be close to top 10 in the nation.
3. Solon - All four players return from a T-32 finish at HSNCT, and this extremely-balanced, well-specialized team is poised to make another deep run. Solon has very few knowledge holes and will be tough to beat.
TIER II
4. Northmont - A very young team with strong coaching. Samantha, Sean, and Zach all had impressive stats at NSC as freshmen and should continue to improve over the year. They will do well this year and could be really scary in 2020.
5. Aurora - Joe Esposito is a great up-and-coming player with generalist ability and is hungry to improve. He has solid support from Sanjana, Daniel, Zach, and others. If they keep improving at the same rate and can get contributions from all four chairs, watch out. I hope they go to states and nationals.
6. Boardman - I may be a bit biased, but I am confident that Boardman will have a strong team this year. I think Danny Turillo was underrated last year; he was crucial to our HSNCT run and has deep knowledge in history (particularly American) and music, and is itching to improve and show off his generalism skills. Co-captain Jack Pendleton provides solid RMP support, and we have some promising young players (including one with good MS geography/history bee knowledge) to fill in some other gaps. With excellent geo, history, and trash coverage, they should be better at NAQT than housewrites.
7. Copley - Tommy and Srikar graduate, but Copley retains a lot of young talent, led by Frank and Nathan. Deep bench as well. With their strong work ethic and good coaching, they won’t fall too far. They always have a solid team, and I wouldn't expect anything different next year.
8. Dublin Scioto - Edward Liu experienced a HUGE shadow effect playing next to Clark, and as proven by stats from NASAT, is a strong player himself, particularly on visual art and science. The Scioto tradition of passing down the torch continues. I’m not sure how much support Eddy has or how active they’ll be, but if Eddy becomes a generalist, Scioto can still remain among the top. Probably will be better at PACE format.
9. Ottawa Hills - They return their top two scorers from a 2nd place SSNCT finish, Mazin and Daniel, but lose Will and Steven. However, they seem to have a pretty deep bench, so I’m sure they can regroup and do well again. Maybe even an SSNCT championship?
10. Tippecanoe - Michael Vestey is a good history player, and has decent support. I believe everyone is returning?
There’s a lot of parity beyond the top 3 and this could change depending on summer studying, so I’m excited to see how everything plays out this year. Sorry if I forgot anyone.