Wild weekend of robotics competition for Notre Dame's FIRST Robotics team included some unfortunate mechanical bad luck.
The Killer Bees (team 33) continued the FIRST Robotics Competition season with their second district event at Milford High School on March 15-16. The luck of the Irish was with the team from the start, as it finished the qualification matches with an 11-1 record and an overall ranking score of 2.91.
The highly anticipated playoff tournament challenged the number #1 alliance of Team 67, the host team from Huron Valley Schools and Team 1701 from the University of Detroit-Jesuit High School. When the buzzer sounded at the end of the first quarterfinal match, the scores looked to favor the #8 alliance, but after the end game score was counted, the #1 alliance prevailed by only 26 points.
During the semifinal rounds, the #1 alliance easily won over the #5 alliance, but in the last semifinal match the luck of the Irish began to run out as a sensor in one of the drive pods became damaged. The Killer Bee pit crew worked rapidly to attempt to fix the sensor, using their timeout to finish the repair. The pod began to respond during the first final match, but later the lift system chain failed and the Bees ran out of time to make the field-side repair.
Team 33's partner, team 67, also suffered a motor failure as they battled to win the tournament. The alliance was unable to overcome these breakdowns, losing to the alliance of teams from Brighton, Hartland and Walled Lake.
Despite those obstacles, the Killer Bees had a great time at Milford, earning the Team Spirit Award for its efforts to help others earn high school credit for FIRST Robotics and spreading the message of FIRST through the RoboZone television series.
Congratulations to friends and partners, FRC Team 67, the Heroes of Tomorrow, for hosting its very first FRC competition.
The weekend's competition completes the Bees' district season and they are currently ranked #4 of 508 teams in the State of Michigan with an automatic qualification to the Michigan State Championship held at Saginaw Valley State University on April 12-14. Their next event is an inter-district competition in Windsor, Ontario, where they will have an opportunity to compete with their Innovation First International sponsor partner team, the Simbotics of St. Catherines, Ontario.
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About Notre Dame Preparatory School and Marist Academy
Notre Dame Preparatory School and Marist Academy is a private, Catholic, independent, coeducational day school located in Oakland County. Notre Dame's upper school enrolls students in grades nine through twelve and has been named one of the nation's best 50 Catholic high schools (Acton Institute) four times since 2005. Notre Dame's middle and lower schools enroll students in pre-kindergarten through grade eight. All three schools are International Baccalaureate "World Schools." NDPMA is conducted by the Marist Fathers and Brothers and is accredited by the Independent Schools Association of the Central States and the North Central Association Commission on Accreditation and School Improvement. For more on Notre Dame Preparatory School and Marist Academy, visit the school's home page at www.ndpma.org.