Thursday Trivia: Now In Cool Ranch Flavor!

Even with one of our busiest Thursday venues taking a night off, we still welcomed 107 teams across 14 games:

FIRST ROUND:

We began Thursday’s game with a look at Eva Peron, the recent World Cup semi-finals, and this upcoming film set to make its star a literal ton of money:

With few surprises in the first round, we saw a whopping 32 teams run the table with perfect scores.

SECOND ROUND:

Thursday’s audio question featured clips from the TV comedies “Leave It to Beaver”, “Alice”, and “Archer”.  We went back to school with some German students and discussed this music video:

The only major speed bump for our teams in the second round was this question on scientists:

–> Which Russian chemist (and namesake for element 101) created the modern version of the Periodic Table of Elements?

Only 31% of the field responded correctly with Dmitri Mendeleev.  As a result, only six teams recorded perfect second round scores.

HALFTIME:

American “Capitals of the World” were featured on Thursday’s halftime page, which yielded an overall average of 15.9 points with six perfect scores.  These were your highest-scoring first half teams on Thursday night:

• Lowered Expectations (Quincy’s):  92
• The Bends (Dawg House):  92
• PC Principals (Fish Market):  91
• Clever Team Name (Quincy’s):  91
• SIX TEAMS TIED WITH 90 POINTS

THIRD ROUND:

Thursday’s second half began with our nightly Three Clues question, with this edition looking at a particular musical instrument:

CLUE 1: This instrument is found in nine varieties including sopranissimo and subcontrabass, the latter of which is about eight feet tall.

CLUE 2: This instrument is named for a 19th century Belgian musician.

Only 11% of our teams earned bonus points by knowing that Adolphe Sax was the namesake for this instrument, whose subcontrabass versions is shown here:

Later, we learned that Franklin Roosevelt was the first U.S. President to be inaugurated in January after the passing of the 20th Amendment to the Constitution.  Another difficult bonus question followed while discussing the novel “Great Expectations”, as only seven teams could identify Alfonso Cuaron as the director of the film adaptation featuring Ethan Hawke, Anne Bancroft, and Gwyneth Paltrow.  As a result, none of our teams recorded perfect third round scores.

6-4-2 QUESTION:

–> Which U.S. state is home to the largest county (by area) in the contiguous United States, covering more than 20,000 square miles?

Only seven teams earned the full six points by knowing that the county in question is California’s San Bernardino County:

(map courtesy of worldatlas.com)

FOURTH ROUND:

Final round topics from Thursday night included fictitious TV businesses, the history of the MLB All-Star Game, and the island of Zanzibar.  We closed the fourth round with the most difficult wagering question of the night, which was a bit of a surprise since it involved a wildly popular Disney film:

–> Not only is this composer is the most recent person to have completed the EGOT, but he is the only person to have won each award twice. For your wager, you can either name this composer or name the song for which he earned an Oscar to complete his first EGOT.

Only 14% of our teams could come up with either answer: Robert Lopez and “Let it Go” from “Frozen”:

Once again, the final round did not yield any perfect scores.  These were your top Thursday team heading into the final question:

• PC Principals (Fish Market):  164
• Anarcho-Syndicalist Commune  (​Smoketown Brewing):  156
• Fan Club (Quincy’s):  155
• Lowered Expectations (Quincy’s):  153
• Uranus Fly Trap  (​Smoketown Brewing):  152

THURSDAY’S FINAL QUESTION (34.6% success rate):

–> Which food brand derives its name from a Spanish word meaning “little golden things”?

Just over one-third of our teams responded correctly here: perhaps they remembered that the lost city of gold was “El Dorado”, or that diminutive Spanish usually end with the letters “ito”.  Either way, they gave us the correct answer of Doritos.  Congratulations to Brother of Menelaus (Fish Market), who recorded the only Perfect 21 on Thursday night thanks to correct answers on all wagering questions.  Here is your final Thursday leaderboard:

• PC Principals (Fish Market):  165
• Lowered Expectations (Quincy’s):  165
• Anarcho-Syndicalist Commune (​Smoketown Brewing):  165
• Brother of Menelaus (Fish Market):  164
• Uranus Fly Trap (​Smoketown Brewing):  164
• Breadsticks (Quincy’s):  161
• 1-2-3 Drink (Cushwa Brewing):  159
• Syn Storm (Beef ‘O’ Brady’s):  158
• Five Sure (Black Walnut Brewery):  157
• Clever Team Name (Quincy’s):  154

THURSDAY’S WINNERS:

The Grille at Flower Hill in Gaithersburg, MD:  Farewell Tour  (Next week’s first category: “Big Brother” – U.S. Edition)

Black Walnut Brewery in Leesburg, VA:  Five Sure  (Next week’s first category: Ireland)

Dawg House in Waynesboro, PA:  Bends  (Next week’s first category: “Talladega Nights”)