PHT World Series XVIII Recap!

The 18th edition of the Pour House Trivia World Series tied a record as we gathered 114 of the region’s best trivia teams at Hager Hall in Hagerstown, Maryland.  Even with an enormous level of trivia talent in the room, the favorite was still the defending champion Dave Martinez School of Management, who had won three of the last five titles and had never finished lower than second place in five World Series appearances.  So how did it all go down on Sunday afternoon?

FIRST ROUND:

Our championship began with a three-part question in which each answer ended with either “IF”, “AND”, or “BUT”.  We looked at an alternate version of the classic short story “The Three Little Pigs” as well as this recent biographical film:

With most teams cruising out of the gate, the final two questions of the opening round quickly separated the field.  First up, this clever vocabulary question:

–> The names of both a Honda car model introduced in 1972 and a 1997 movie starring Mira Sorvino fit this specific distinction.  The South American shrub known as a divi-divi is the longest word in the dictionary to fit this specific distinction.  What is this distinction?

Since the car model referenced in this question was the Honda Civic, this led to the most common wrong answer of ‘palindromes’.  Despite its double-speak nature, the word divi-divi is not a palindrome.  Instead, divi-divi, Civic, and “Mimic” (The Mira Sorvino film) are all words which are comprised only of Roman numerals.  After just 31% of the field earned points here, we closed the opening stanza with another difficult question, this time in the category of the NFL Playoffs:

–> Though it appeared in three consecutive NFC Championship games earlier this decade, which team has failed to reach the playoffs in each of the last five seasons?

Just under half of our teams gave us the correct response of the San Francisco 49ers, who found success from 2011 to 2013 with quarterbacks Alex Smith and Colin Kaepernick.  Eight teams recorded a perfect first round score:

• Dave Martinez School of Management
• Ralf Fines
• PC Principals
• Cher’s Zombie Army
• Smarter Than We Look
• Ingenious Bastards
• Avocados to Crabs
• J. T. Snow School of Babysitting.

SECOND ROUND:

The World Series audio question featured three songs whose titles reference the theatre: “Applause” by Lady Gaga, “The Show Must Go On” by Queen, and “Take a Bow” by Madonna.  Just over one-fourth of our teams picked up bonus points with all three correct answers.  Next, we took a ride on this unique vehicle:

We continued with the most difficult bonus question of the first half.  After most of the field recognized the backstory behind the Vincent Van Gogh Painting “The Starry Night”, only 22% of our teams earned two bonus points by also knowing that it is currently housed in the Museum of Modern Art (MoMa) in New York City.  Other second round topics included the TV sitcom “The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air” and the recent video games “Super Mario Odyssey” and “Assassin’s Creed Odyssey”.  None of our teams recorded a perfect second round score.

HALFTIME:

The clouds rolled in for the World Series halftime page, as our teams were asked to decipher song lyric “word clouds” such as this:

The bottom half of the halftime page dealt with the favorite foods of fictional characters.  This halftime page yielded perfect scores to 15% of the field while the overall average landed at 16.5 points.  These were your highest scoring teams from the first half of World Series XVIII:

• J. T. Snow School of Babysitting:  90
• Ralf Fines:  90
• Hamster Condiments:  89
• Athletic Supporters:  87
• Hundo P:  87

THIRD ROUND:

We kicked off the second half with a question in the the Three Clues format, but these first two clues gave us the most difficult bonus question of the entire game:

CLUE 1: Burger King is currently headquartered in this city’s metropolitan area.

CLUE 2: It was officially incorporated in 1896 after Julia Tuttle encouraged a railroad mogul to expand into the area, making it the only major U.S. city to be founded by a woman.

At this point, only 12% of the field earned these hard-fought bonus points by turning in the correct answer of Miami.  Next, we discussed the derivation of the phrase “It’s Greek to me” and this religious landmark:

The majority of our teams could identify a description of the Cambodian temple Angkor Wat, but only 17% of the field picked up two bonus points by also knowing that it was NOT a Buddhist temple, but was built to honor the Hindu god Vishnu.  We closed the third round with a question regarding these figures from American history:

Why did 19th century politicians always looked so angry in their portraits?  J. T. Snow School of Babysitting moved into sole possession of the lead after posting the only perfect score of the third round.

FOURTH ROUND:

The final round of World Series XVIII opened with a relatively easy question regarding boy bands, before moving on to what proved to be the most difficult wagering question of the game:

–> Likely an homage to Donald Trump’s best-selling book, a 1998 collection of Star Wars comics subtitled “The Art of the Deal” focuses on which character, whose likeness appears on the cover?

Just under 30% of our teams responded correctly with Jabba the Hutt.  Next we asked the field to identify either one of the two NBA players who have each had their jersey retired by three different teams.  Naming Wilt Chamberlain was no problem for most teams, but only 15% of the field earned bonus points by also naming this “Pistol” as the second answer:

After concluding the final round with a three-part qord scramble featuring the titles of Charles Dickens novels, Meet the Press posted the only perfect score of the final round.  These were your highest scoring World Series teams heading into the final question:

• J. T. Snow School of Babysitting:  162
• PC Principals:  155
• Dave Martinez School of Management:  154
• Dr. Leo Marvin and Associates:  152
• Hundo P:  151

FINAL QUESTION (12.3% success rate):

–> There are 16 states in the contiguous U.S. whose capital city is also its most populous city.  Which of these states does NOT border any of the other fifteen?

With virtually every team waiting until the last second to turn in a response, the suspense was higher than any previous world Series.  As we eliminated the wrong answers one slide at a time, many of our top teams watche their championship hopes slip away.  In the end, 17 teams gave us this correct answer:

The most populous city in Iowa is its state capital Des Moines, while each of its six bordering states do not fit the same description.  After leading the field for the entire game, J. T. Snow School of Babysitting was one of the 14 teams that answered correctly, hanging on for its second PHT World Series title.  Fittingly, our champions were also the only team in the field to answer all 21 wagering questions correctly.

Another championship is in the books!  Thank you to all of our loyal teams for another successful season and a highly competitive World Series.  We’ll see you back at Hager Hall in June!

FINAL STANDINGS:

1) J.T. Snow School of Babysitting	168
2) Dave Martinez School of Management	165
3) It’s Mueller Time (wins 3rd place tiebreaker)	160
4) Power Vacuum	160
5) Rock the Cash Bar	152
T-6) Unsavories	151
T-6) Fat Kids Are Hard to Kidnap	151
8) Killer Snails	150
9) Gouda ‘Nuff For Me	148
T-10) Meet The Press	143
T-10) PC Principals	143
T-12) Dr. Leo Marvin and Associates	140
T-12) Rum Ham	140
T-14) Hundo P	139
T-14) Sexual Chocolate	139
T-16) George Washington’s Camel	137
T-16) How Did I Get Here?	137
T-16) Hamster Condiments	137
T-19) High School Prom	136
T-19) His and Her Peas	136
T-21) Space Force Marching Band	135
T-21) Stink Floyd	135
23) Southpaw Fish	134
T-24) Arrondissements of Ouagadougou	132
T-24) Bueller… Bueller…	132
T-24) MAJ	132
T-24) Kitten Mittens	132
T-28) Flight Level Awesome	131
T-28) My Black Hole Just Exploded	131
T-28) Cher’s Zombie Army	131
T-31) Fan Club	130
T-31) Comfortably Dum	130
33) Three Clues One Disaster	129
34) Five Dollar Boob Job	128
T-35) Smarter Than We Look	127
T-35) Cultured Heathens	127
T-35) Uranus Fly Trap	127
T-35) Cuginis Now Offering Free Beer	127
T-39) Teachers	126
T-39) Charging Our Fireballs	126
T-39) Irish Beer Mafia	126
T-39) Blockheads	126
43) Athletic Supporters	125
T-44) Clashburn	124
T-44) Smarty Pants	124
T-46) Trojan Pride	123
T-46) Wiseacres	123
T-46) Uncle Jack	123
T-49) Brain Freeze	122
T-49) Witiots	122
T-49) Washington Foreskins	122
T-52) Griffindorks	121
T-52) Simple Minds	121
54) Anything But Sports	120
T-55) Punslingers	119
T-55) Save the Clock Tower	119
57) Ralf Fines	118
T-58) Just Good Enough	116
T-58) 1-2-3 Drink	116
60) Thoroughly Screwed	115
61) Identical Tentacles	114
T-62) All Glory to the Hypnotoad	113
T-62) Friends Jennings	113
T-64) Avocados to Crabs	112
T-64) Tokyo Tentacle Storm	112
T-64) Bet Smart	112
T-67) Bonesaw	111
T-67) Blood Legion	111
T-67) Chef Goldblum’s Raptor Bites	111
T-67) Charlie’s Angels	111
T-67) Literally Anything	111
72) Ingenious Bastards	109
T-73) Leprachauns	108
T-73) Shoes for Feet	108
T-73) Vitrifers	108
T-73) Tuna Noodle Casserole	108
T-77) Zambookie	107
T-77) Breadsticks	107
T-77) Castle Greyskull	107
T-77) Half Nelson	107
T-81) Super NOVA	103
T-81) Crusty Broads	103
83) Shakeweight	102
84) Crystal Methodists	101
T-85) Stupid Sexy Flanders	100
T-85) Momentary Lapse of Reason	100
T-85) Spiritual Growth Hormone	100
88) Singing Inferno	99
T-89) Befuddled	98
T-89) I Don’t Know Who	98
91) Special Eds	97
T-92) Our Cup Size is Stanley	95
T-92) Vitamin R	95
94) Not Your Team	94
95) Irregardlessly Unrevelant	93
T-96) Tequila Mockingbird	92
T-96) Your Mom	92
T-98) Mud Duck Hunt Club	91
T-98) Threat Level Midnight	91
100) E = MC Hammer	89
101) Spontaneous Combustion	88
T-102) Ace of Spades	86
T-102) Sloppy Seconds	86
T-104) This is How We Go Down	85
T-104) Gemsters	85
106) Holy Shirts and Pants	83
107) Where’s Len?	82
108) Knuckleheads	80
T-109) Cotton Headed Ninny Muggins	78
T-109) Prestige Worldwide	78
T-109) 1KD	78
112) Mom and Dad Save the World	70
113) Juneau	66
114) JFKFC	40