This time, we’ll be skipping Richard Montgomery B and North Hollywood B.
180. Bethlehem A (NY) – This team returns Ben Weinstein, Eric Wolfsberg, and Jonah Goldberg, their top three scorers. This team, which made the top 12 at this year’s Prison Bowl in their only non-Masterminds pyramidal tournament, could achieve greater things next season if they pursue it.
Expected performance next season: up
178. Hannibal A (MO) – With their best finish this year likely their second place finish at the Helias Catholic Tournament, they return lead scorer Parth Parikh and contributor Tim Quintanilla.
Expected performance next season: up
177. Clover Hill A (VA) – A strong season with a fourth place finish at the NAQT Virginia State Championship and sixth at the very deep University of Virginia’s Cavalier Classic punctuated the careers of Zach Perkins and, more importantly, Evan Washington. With the lost of these two players, this will be a rebuilding year for Clover Hill.
Expected performance next season: down
176. Keystone A (TX) – While this teams returns 3/4 of their players from the TQBA State Championship, the difficulty they face next year is that the graduating senior, Drew Schaffer, scored nearly 3/4 of their points on tossups. Still, this team just concluded a season with a 7th place finish at that State Championship, not to mention 2nd place at the Fiesta Tournament, the Alamo City Challenge, and the Bexar Bowl.
Expected performance next season: down
175. Cistercian A (TX) – 2013-14 was a year in which Cistercian took third at the St. Mark’s Invitational and first at the L.L. Lewis Cup. This was the final year for David Losson Mitchell Sawtelle and Joshua Maynir, but this is a school that’s showed an ability to rebuild in the past, and likely will again.
Expected performance next season: down
174. Athens Academy A (GA) – While a couple support players graduate from Athens, they return their two top scorers (Timmy and Saad). They should be able to improve on finishes at the GATA Class 1A State Championship.
Expected performance next season: up
173. Norman North A (OK) – After just missing out on the playoffs at the NAQT HSNCT (and finishing as one of the top scoring teams on the wrong end of a 5-5 record), this team does lose solid contributor Will Long but returns star player Caleb Kendrick.
Expected performance next season: up
171. Bergen County A (NJ) – A team that possibly over-performed at the PACE NSC by tying for 47th loses a couple of contributors but returns two of their top three scorers. Losing a few key contributors will make it harder for them to replicate that performance, but it seems like they have the depth to accomplish that.
Expected performance next season: slightly down
HSQBRank 
First, a correction of fact: Joshua Maymir will VERY MUCH be returning to play as a senior next year, as he just finished his junior year at Cistercian. Would you care to revise your expected performance prediction?
Second, Mitchell Sawtelle is the other senior (Along with David Losson) who will not be returning.
Third: Father Gregory Schweers, O.Cist., coach for Cistercian Prep’s QB team since 1989, has returned from his year-long sabbatical in London, and will resume his full-time coaching of the Upper School teams. Father Augustine Hoelke, O. Cist., will continue in the role of assistant coach and work with Middle School coaching.
I typed Maymir’s name when I meant Sawtelle. It doesn’t change the projections at all since I used the correct statistics.
THANK YOU!
Re: Bethlehem…Wolfsberg, in particular, is a quizbowl beast in the making, and he has great support in Ben and Jonah. All this team really lacks is non-MasterMinds and History Bowl experience, and they’ll get plenty of that this year now that they’re more aware and tied into the quizbowl circuit. Their geographical location makes Boston-area, metro-NYC and upstate tournaments all pretty convenient drives for them.
Last year, they were the second-best team in upstate NY behind Ithaca A, and would’ve been a contender to make HSNCT playoffs had they attended. They were, by far, the best in MasterMinds (in which Ithaca does not compete), and showed at Prison Bowl that they could also compete quite well on more difficult material. This year, they are joint pre-season #1 in the region along with Ithaca A (Ithaca A is starting 4 sophomores, albeit very talented ones, this season and the fact that Bethlehem lost practically nothing to graduation has probably drawn them level with Ithaca), and assuming no major regional powers attend BrainBusters Fall in November, are probably co-favorites along with Ithaca to win that tournament. They could also make HSNCT or NSC playoff rounds and scare some teams while they’re there. I think their outlook for this year is actually WAY up.
Sorry to be pedantic, but Jonah graduated.