UNC Asheville's Wild Ride

[Jacob Paikoff]

Originally Posted by PayneTrain

While all of this is true, I don't see why NC FIRST didn't try to push teams into the Asheville event by only running 3 districts and eliminating either Guilford, Wake or CU/JCC. There are not as many teams in Southwest VA as there are in Central VA, but a lot of us hoofed it out to the western part of the state for a travel play instead of relying on two district events in our metro area.

I believe the original idea was to run 4 32 team events as opposed to 3 40 team events to both try to lessen travel for teams and spread the events out a little bit more. All the other NC events averaged 32 teams. A couple more third plays from NC teams and the number of teams in Asheville wouldn't have been a problem.

[marshall]

Originally Posted by PayneTrain

Marie (who is seriously one of the coolest people I have ever had the pleasure of meeting at an event)

Yeah she is! Best FRC regional/district director ever!!!!

[Billfred]

My two cents as an outsider:

1) Yes, FIRST should have a contingency in the manual for events with less than 27 teams with details on how that affects district points.
2) That contingency should be a last resort after the good-faith efforts of the district committee fail.
3) If the option were offered to Garnet Squadron (in non-district South Carolina), it would get a LOT of consideration.
4) Yes, Marie is hella awesome.

[caseybarisax14]

Glad you guys had fun in North Carolina thanks for all the help and team 587 is now in love with your riveter lol. Hope to see you back next year.

[ty.sayman]

Originally Posted by marshall

Yeah she is! Best FRC regional/district director ever!!!!

I'll pile in on this sentiment!
Marie does a fantastic job for NC.

[bpw823]

Us at 238 enjoyed our break from the freezing clutches of NH, and loved the venue, the people, and the environment of the competition. Thanks to 422 and all other teams who put on a great challenge for everyone! We hope to come back next year!

[JohnM]

Here's a segment that Western North Carolina's biggest news station did for the UNCA competition.

http://wlos.com/community/carolina-m...nt-team-glitch

[Moretti]

Asheville definitely was a wild ride. There were a lot of close matches decided by really small details: One robot on an alliance who weakened the tower had one wheel on the carpet (so they didn't get an extra 30 points because of that), A high goal in the last 20 seconds decided a match, you get my point.
The 24 team list was definitely awkward during alliance selection, I talked with a team who purposefully went for a middle-ranking position so they didn't get one of the last picks. In the future, the playoff bracket should be reduced or more teams should be encouraged to join.

[Monochron]

Originally Posted by Moretti

In the future, the playoff bracket should be reduced or more teams should be encouraged to join.

More teams were encouraged to join, very much so. Fixing the issue here sadly isn't as simple as asking more teams to come out.

[marshall]

Originally Posted by Monochron

More teams were encouraged to join, very much so. Fixing the issue here sadly isn't as simple as asking more teams to come out.

Yeah... I think there were a lot of factors playing into it but I suspect next year that there is going to be a lot more inter-district play and the number of teams at NC's districts will increase.

[PayneTrain]

Originally Posted by marshall

Yeah... I think there were a lot of factors playing into it but I suspect next year that there is going to be a lot more inter-district play and the number of teams at NC's districts will increase.

We will be campaigning for more teams to play more. If we had more bandwidth at the mentor level, I'd love to compete in as many events as there are weeks in the season, as long as all of the events were as fun as NCASH.