[Paul Copioli]

I did not want to go down this road in this thread, but since it already has travelled there I feel it is imperative that I respond to any and all hints that what transpired was against FIRST rules, against the spirit of the rules, or just plain underhanded.

I will first say this: the strategy that was implemented was 100% initiated by me. No one else on 217 or 66 were in on it. I brought it up to 66 right after we found out we might be selected by them. If you do not agree with the strategy that is laid out in this post, that is fine but blame no one but me. Also, this post is brutally honest, so I hope no one gets hard feelings, but it may happen.

One important note: prior to any discussion between team 66 and team 217, team 66 approached the Hot team as 66 wanted to pick Hot first. This is a fact and team 66 was sincere when they approached team 67.

I asked team 66 if they were going to pick us (all indications were that this was a fact) and they stated that they approached team 67 first and 67 told 66 they would probably say no. As a result, team 217 was their first choice. Team 217 really wanted to be selected by the #2 team, 47, but knew that telling 66 we would say no to them was just a lie since we were out of the top 8.

I considered this a dilemma as I did not think the alliance would go very far in the eliminations as I predicted we needed two good hurdlers to win. 66 was not a hurdler. I decided we needed to use the blocking strategy. This strategy is perfectly legitimate and, given the ridiculous serpentine draft (don't get me started), basically the only way a team seeded at number 1 can defend against super alliances. I knew that 27 and 33 would say no to 66, not because I asked them, but because that is what team 217 would have done in their position. Granted, team 66 was not comfortable with this as they thought 27 or 33 would say yes. I knew this was simply not the case.

Now for team 67. I have to admit that I thought the chances of 67 saying yes were 50/50, but in either case both 217 and 66 were to benefit from the blocking strategy. I will say this, I strongly urged 66 to ask 67 anyway because I basically did not trust that 67 would say no to a 47 or 27 or 33 if 66 just trusted 67. **See the historical side note at the bottom of this post** for the reason.

I firmly believe that if it was not for this blocking strategy, our alliance would not have made it to the finals. If any member of any of the teams are angry or displeased about the turn of events, please PM me and we can discuss it. However, I have no regrets for what transpired and I believe it is a perfectly legitimate strategy well within the rules and guidelines given to us.

-Paul

**Historical Side Note**
At the 2003 MidWest Regional, we were the number 2 seed and wanted to pair with Baxter (team 16). We asked them ahead of time if they would accept and their response was, "no, because we want to select our own alliance." Given that, we decided to just select our number 2 pick at the time (111, if you can believe they were our second choice). During alliance selections, they accpeted an offer from the number 3 alliance and eventually defeated our alliance in the semi-finals. This little FIRST lesson will always be with team 217 and we will continue to use the blocking strategy as long as it is within the FIRST rules to do so.