There were two fantastic rookies in Archimedes this year that were close to the top of our pick lists (but unfortunately no one else's!).
4946, The Alpha Dogs, was a fantastic trussing machine. On our list of trussers, they were either second or third. They could long truss like 900 or they could do a shorter truss as well.
4914, The Panthers, had an interesting robot in that they had no floor pickup. And we wanted them to finish for us
. They had a large net for human loading that made human loading super-easy, and we wanted them to receive a pass from a human player and make a high goal shot from the low goal. They were right on the cusp of being picked by our alliance.
Unfortunately we did not get the chance to pick either of these rookies- and an even greater folly was that they didn't get picked at all!
4946 was rightfully awarded the Rookie Inspiration Award, however, and both rookie teams deserve to be mentioned.
Look out for them in the next couple years!
Fun fact: In researching these two rookies, we ventured out of Archimedes to 610's pit and found one of their students there to ask about these Canadian rookies they had competed with. Upon mention of 4946, his eyes lit up:
"You mean ALPHA DOGE!?!?!?"
Needless to say that's what we referred to them as for the rest of the weekend in our strategy meetings. Alpha Doge and the Net-bot. They both would have made such fantastic alliance partners.