2023 Philly League Varsity Tournament
You can’t write a Varsity Math story much better than this.
This Varsity Tournament, like in the regular season, there didn’t seem to be a clear “best team” until the very end. In the regular season, the Springside Chestnut Hill Academy Blue Devils, the Friends Central Phoenix, the Episcopal Academy Math Club Churchmen, the Germantown Friends Tigers, and The Hill School Rams all looked like the strongest team at some point, but it took until week 9 before the George School Varsity Math Team Cougars solidified themselves as the strongest team in the league.
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The Philly League didn't look like there was a top team until the GSVMT Cougars pulled major victories against the Churchmen and Gators in the last two weeks.
Meanwhile, in the Varsity Tournament, we saw the Rams start off with a strong 6-4/6 victory against the Moose, then the Moose bounced back with a 25-16/30 win against GSVMT White, and then the Churchmen, who hadn’t looked so great so far, dominated the next two rounds. This led to the best Varsity Math match that I’ve ever seen, where the Cougars clapped back from being behind 3 points for most of the match and surged ahead to become the first ever team to win a Varsity Tournament at home.
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Now let’s do a recap of all of the rounds.
Like last year, we had twelve teams from eleven schools attending the Varsity Tournament, this time held at George School’s Fitness and Athletic Center (FAC). The Friends Central Phoenix joined for their first ever Varsity Tournament after joining the Philly Varsity Math League this year. The GSVMT Cougars, as the host team, submitted two teams, Green (which we refer to as the GSVMT Cougars) and White, with Green being down one player as usual (it’s just a GSVMT thing to be down players). Returning from last year’s Varsity Tournament were the EA Math Club Churchmen, the Westtown Moose, The Hill School Rams, the Shipley Varsity Math Team Gators, the Abington Friends School Roos, The Haverford School Archimedes Association Fords, the William Penn Charter School Quakers, the Agnes Irwin Owls, and the SCHA Blue Devils. Rules also seemed to mimic the 2021 Varsity Tournament rules for the team and solo rounds.
Like last year, the competition was split into five rounds, but there was no individual tiebreaker round needed. In the first round, the top four teams by PL (Philly League) rankings in attendance, which were the GSVMT Cougars, the EA Math Club Churchmen, The Hill School Rams, and the Westtown Moose received byes and played practice rounds against each other, while the other teams faced off in the first round of the bracket. This time, teams split up into two groups, each submitting a set of answers, and the higher score would be the one counted.
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Round 1:
In the team round, the Penn Charter Quakers and GSVMT White played against each other in a close and exciting match. In the end, GSVMT White, led by senior captain Ally Fu, narrowly won 4-3/6 to advance to take on the Westtown Moose. We also had the SCHA Blue Devils play the Agnes Irwin Owls, a matchup that we might not have seen since the 2019 regular season. The Blue Devils advanced with a 4-2/6 victory to get a rematch against The Hill School Rams, who they played twice in the regular season. Meanwhile, we had the Shipley Varsity Math Team Gators playing against the AFS Roos. These two had played each other in the first round of the 2022 Varsity Tournament at Shipley in a close match. This time, both teams played very well, but the Gators, led by star player junior Richard Liu, advanced 5-3/6 to take on the GSVMT Cougars, setting up a “Varsity Bottle” rivalry match. In the closest match of the first round, we had the FCS Phoenix taking on The Haverford School Archimedes Association Fords. Both teams ended up scoring two points, but the Phoenix ended up advancing on time by 10 seconds, which meant that they would be playing the EA Math Club Churchmen next.
Speaking of the Churchmen, they were playing the GSVMT Cougars in a rematch of week 8 of this season, and they had previously faced off against the Cougars in the finals of last year’s Varsity Tournament and in round 1 of last year’s Varsity Tournament. With the Cougars down a player for the third straight Varsity Tournament, the Cougars surged ahead to surprise everyone with a two point 6-4/6 victory. Meanwhile, in a rematch of week 7 and last year’s third place matchup, the Westtown Moose and The Hill School Rams faced each other in another exciting matchup, but the Rams emerged victorious with a 6-4/6 victory.
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Round 2:
Round two was similar to regular season matches, but with scores out of 30.
In the consolation bracket, we got the first ever “Bridge Bottle” between the Fords and the Roos, where league manager and legendary coach Nathan Bridge’s current team took on his former team. In a very close match, the Roos, led by Julia Ma, emerged victorious, winning 12-10/30. Also in the consolation bracket, we had a rematch between the Quakers and Owls. The Quakers narrowly won against the Owls during the second week of the regular season, but performed better later in the season against the Owls. The Quakers, led by Ege Gungor, dominated this match and advanced 12-7/30 to set up a match against the AFS Roos.
In the main bracket, we had the Moose taking on GSVMT White. This was a very high scoring match, but GSVMT White’s defense was not able to contain the Moose, and the Moose advanced to the semifinals by a score of 25-16. Meanwhile, GSVMT Green (Cougars) was taking on the Gators in a Varsity Bottle rivalry match and a rematch of the 2021 Varsity Tournament Finals were the Cougars won 18-13/30. The Cougars, led by nine time champion MC Gu, were looking to become the first host team since the 2019 Fords to make it to the semifinals, and they accomplished this with a 19-10/30 win against the Gators, setting up a Cougars vs Moose semifinals for the third straight Varsity Tournament.
On the other side of the bracket, the Phoenix were taking on another Inter AC D1 team in the Churchmen. The Phoenix, who were without their star player, number 10 ranked Jack Barsotti, were able to hold the Churchmen to only 16 points, but this was not enough to advance, and the Churchmen, led by JD Krasnick and Xinxin Fang, walked away with a 16-10/30 victory. Meanwhile, the SCH Blue Devils were looking to get revenge against The Hill School Rams. Unfortunately, they weren’t able to do this, and the Rams, led by Dawei Sun, advanced to the semifinals by a score of 16-10/30, setting up a Churchmen vs Rams semifinals for the second straight Varsity Tournament.
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A new Philly League tradition: The Golden Bottle
Every individual champion (PL, VT, MM, or KB) will get a picture with this special item
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Round 3:
This was the solo round, featuring two bracket matches and four non-bracket matches.
The Shipley Gators were looking to get another FSL win, this time against the FCS Phoenix. The Gators, led by senior Amber Feng, ended up winning 16-7/30, keeping their chances of the consolation championship alive. Meanwhile, GSVMT White was taking on the Blue Devils in the other bracket match. In a defensive match, the Blue Devils advanced to the consolation semifinals by a score of 9-5/30.
Meanwhile, in the non-bracket matches, we had the PC Quakers taking on the Fords. The last time these two teams met, we got an exciting 9T-9/30 match where the Fords advanced on time. This time, we had a higher scoring match, but this time, the Quakers won 18-11/30. We also had the Roos taking on the Owls. After a nailbiter in week 9 of last year’s regular season, we had another extremely close match in week four this year. This time, however, the Roos took the win by a score of 11-4/30.
We also had two possible finals previews this round, with the Cougars taking on the Rams and the Moose taking on the Churchmen. Despite the suboptimal performances in the first two rounds, the Churchmen, led by David Ding and Xinxin Fang, blew out the Moose by a score of 20-9/30. The Cougars and Rams faced off in the newly named “Legends Bottle,” and in a match similar to the old times of GSVMT legend Forest Ho-Chen and The Hill School legend Tiffany Wang, we got a very exciting match, this one narrowly won by the Cougars 20-17/30. Since this was the solo round, individual standings would also be determined here. We had a few students score 5/6, including Ethan Ryu of the Rams, David Ding and Xinxin Fang of the Churchmen, and two unknown people on the Cougars, but only one student got a perfect 6/6, MC Gu, making him the individual champion again.
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MC Gu won his third individual championship at the 2023 Varsity Tournament. The previous record for most individual championships was one.
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Round 4:
This was the semifinal round and was back to the team rounds. This round was very exciting, with five very close matches and a record breaking match.
The Owls and Phoenix faced off twice in the regular season, both matches being very defense oriented. The same thing happened here with the Phoenix narrowly defeating the Owls in a defense oriented 2-1/6 matchup. Meanwhile, the Blue Devils and Gators were also in a very defensive matchup, and in the end, the Blue Devils won 2-1/6. The Roos and Quakers were having a rematch of week 1, which was another very close match. While the week 1 match featured two strong offenses, like the other two matches already mentioned, this was a defense oriented match that the Roos won 2-1/6.
Meanwhile, the Fords and GSVMT White were engaged in an offense oriented match. This match was very close, and in the end, GSVMT White, led by Ally Fu, ended up winning 4T-4/6 by a margin of 20 seconds.
In the semifinals, the Churchmen and the Rams were engaged in another high scoring offense oriented matchup, similar to their week 3 encounter in the regular season. The Churchmen got an early lead and never let go, and in the end, the Churchmen won 6-4/6.
Finally, the GSVMT Cougars were looking to avenge GSVMT White by taking on the Moose. The Cougars got off to an early lead and ended up going up 5-2. The Moose could not make a comeback, and the Cougars advanced to the finals by a score of 5-3/6. According to our archives, this also marks the first time that a team has gotten double digit victories against another team. This also meant that the GSVMT Cougars became the first host team since the 2019 Fords to make it to the finals. However, they would be taking on the EA Math Club Churchmen, who also beat the 2019 Fords, so the finals would be a very tough matchup for GSVMT.
The EA Churchmen had previously beaten the Varsity Tournament host in 2019 to capture their first championship. Would they do the same in 2023?
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Round 5:
The fifth round was the final round and was done individually.
The Owls and Fords faced each other, with the Fords looking for revenge from last year’s 13-12/35 upset victory for the Owls that ended up putting the Owls at third place in the Inter AC last year. This time, the Fords dominated, winning 11-2/30.
Meanwhile, GSVMT White, who had already broken the streak of the home team’s backups getting last place, was taking on the FCS Phoenix. GSVMT White, led by Ally Fu, Peter Tang, and Max Lin, ended up taking a 13-8/30 victory against the Phoenix to secure 9th place.
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Distribution:
GSVMT White: 3+3+3+2+2
Phoenix: 3+2+2+1+0
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The Shipley Gators and PC Quakers faced off again for the first time since the 2021 Varsity Tournament Quarterfinals, where the Gators eliminated the Quakers on their second place run. This time, the Quakers, led by Vikram Verma and Ege Gungor, were able to pick up a narrow 13-10/30 win.
Distribution:
Quakers: 4+4+3+1+1
Gators: 3+3+2+1+1
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In the consolation tournament finals for fifth place, the AFS Roos and SCH Blue Devils faced off in yet another close match. Both teams had won close games against each other in the past, but this time, the Blue Devils, led by Hudson Barry, pulled ahead with a 12-9/30 win to secure fifth place.
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The Consolation Bracket for fifth place.
Congratulations to SCHA.
In the third place matchup, the Rams and Moose were at it again in a rematch of last year’s third place matchup. While the Moose were able to get a statement 6-3/30 win last year, the Rams, led by number 5 ranked Yvonne Bao, were able to beat the Moose in an exciting 23-19/30 offense masterclass.
Distribution:
Rams: 6+5+4+4+4
Moose: 5+4+4+3+3
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Your third place team, The Hill School Rams
And finally, we have the Varsity Tournament finals, also known as the “Philly Bottle.” The rematch of last year’s matchup, the host team, the number one seeded GSVMT Cougars, taking on the number two seeded EA Math Club Churchmen. The Churchmen came into this match looking like the team to beat after a suboptimal start, and they had previously won in the finals against another host team, the 2019 Fords, though there was some controversy regarding the wording of one question.
Last year, the Churchmen had just come back from down 4-2 against the Rams in the last minute to win 5-4/6. But the Cougars, after going down 2-0 after five minutes due to two early points by Conestoga transfer David Ding, clapped back to get a narrow halftime lead before going back and forth and dominating the last five minutes to win 13-9/30.
Things went a bit differently this time. The Cougars and Churchmen were tied up 3-3 in the first few minutes, but then the Churchmen got ahead by 3 due to some quick work by Daniel Adibi and David Ding. However, the Cougars were determined not to let the Churchmen get too far ahead, and though they trailed by three points for almost five minutes, they sometimes got within one point of the Churchmen. The Churchmen held onto their lead through halftime, but then, around six minutes left, the Cougars started an unbelievable comeback led by MC Gu, tying the match at 16 at 6 minutes left, then going up 18-16 a few seconds later. The Cougars then started to run away with the lead, going up 20-16 with only 5.5 minutes left, and then got up 23-16 with 5 minutes left. The Churchmen tried to get back into the match with some points by JD Krasnick, but the Cougars had pulled ahead 25-17 with two perfect scores, one by MC Gu (I have no idea who is who on the Cougars), and some late points scored by Jackson Yang. With one minute left, the Churchmen tried to pull another comeback, but this was unsuccessful, and the Cougars ended up winning the Philly Bottle by a score of 27-20/30 in the best Varsity Math match I have ever seen.
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Distribution:
Cougars: 6+6+5+5+5
Churchmen: 5+5+4+3+3
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And so the George School Varsity Math Team, once projected to go 1-19, showed why great coaching and captaining leadership can allow a team to overcome even the biggest obstacles. We’d also like to highlight two other teams, the Penn Charter Quakers and the Friends Central Phoenix, who both had very similar stories to GSVMT, both surpassing preseason expectations, especially with the Quakers losing two very strong captains and with this being the first year for the Phoenix. This really shows that it’s not about how you start. It’s about how you finish. And this year, despite not starting off very well, the GSVMT Cougars were the ones that were able to get things done. Congratulations Cougars on your third Varsity Tournament Championship and your ninth overall championship!
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Teams:
1) George School Varsity Math Team Cougars
MC Gu, Jackson Yang, Kevin Gong, Luke Zhang, Simone Lu, Ricky Hou, Bill Li
2) EA Math Club Churchmen
Daniel Adibi, Minsi Cui, Connor Myers, Ben Klick, David Ding, Joseph Xu, Xinxin Fang, JD Krasnick
3) The Hill School Rams
David Sun, Yvonne Bao, Adelyn Sim, Ethan Ryu, Ethan Luo, Sophia Xuan, James Gong, Lola Ge
4) Westtown Moose
Ethan Shaman, Isabella Jin, Bailey Tuckman, Anqi Wang, Tiantong Hu, Max Zhang, Peishan Huang
5) Penn Charter Quakers
Ege Gungor, Vikram Verma, Alexandra Will, Luke Fiss, Brady Cross, Henry Greenberg, Marko Vucetic, Alice Allsopp
6) SCHA Blue Devils
Ward Dobeck, Sean Gupte, Hudson Barry, David Xin, Stone Xin, Aaron Jia, Nick Donato, Arjun Goswami
7) Shipley Varsity Math Team Gators
Josh Cohen, Emily Kucharczuk, Richard Liu, Amber Feng, Hailey Li, Doris Du, Anne Gu, Graham Kokas
8) Friends Central Phoenix
Ari Barak, Frances Adams, Gemma Chiang, Abigail Greenberg, Liser Li Justin Chen, Bowen Xu
9) The Haverford School Archimedes Association Fords
Devin Carpenter, Phineas Manogue, Ajay Chakraborty, Jonny Wang, Nicholas Zafiriou, Ryan Shams
10) AFS Roos
Timmy Ma, Sophia Wang, Xin Wei, Neil Johnson, Hannah Rozenbaum, Julia Ma, Lori Lei, Karishma Levy
11) Agnes Irwin Owls
Orchie Hasan, Lila McDonald, Aliane Vanderver, Caitlyn Liang, Grace Meyerle, Kelsey Meyerle, Kate Spirn, Ella Springer
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12) GSVMT White
Max Lin, Ally Fu, Dalton Guan, Peter Tang, Alana Sung, Anna Gluschuk, Anne Huang, and Ben Pham
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Final standings:
1. Cougars
2. Churchmen
3. Rams
4. Moose
5. Blue Devils
6. Roos
7. Quakers
8. Gators
9. GSVMT White
10. Phoenix
11. Fords
12. Owls
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MC Gu now has 11 total championships (8 team, 3 individual).
GSVMT wins the Varsity Tournament to win their 9th championship (5 PL, 3 VT, 1 KB).
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