Math Madness: Avon Lake High Crowned National Champions

AVON LAKE, OH — The Avon Lake High Math Team are now national champions after winning the Division II grouping of Math Madness.

The single-elimination tournament saw a group of Avon Lake students answering a set of unique math questions, trying to get more correct answers than another high school that had been matched up with the Shoremen. The tournament was structured like the NCAA basketball March Madness tournament — with seeding and one-off competitions.

Scoring in Math Madness is based on a team's top five scores on a math test. Having even two exceptionally strong performers can make a huge difference, particularly if there are difficult questions.

Avon Lake squeezed out a win in the Sweet 16, then faced Ann Sobrato High (from California) in the Elite Eight, winning 22-12. In the Final Four, the team faced Chamblee Charter School, a George-based institution.

The team's coach, Jim Goodman, said the match-up was a tough one. The questions posed to both teams were extremely difficult, but Avon Lake won the game 20-15.

In the Finals, Avon Lake faced the Roxbury Latin School, a Massachusetts school. Goodman anticipated a "very tight matchup!"

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The match went into an epic overtime showdown.

"In the match we were actually down most of the time. Our second highest scorer, Irwin Deng, worked all of the problems on paper without entering them into the computer until the last minute. He said he wanted to “build suspense.” So we were down at least four points with about a minute to go, but when Irwin entered his solutions he got 6/8 and pulled us up into a tie with them, 22-22," Goodman told Patch in an email.

The Avon Lake Math Team then won on the tie-breaker: how long it took students to answer each question. Avon Lake students took 29:21 per question, Roxbury needed 29:52 to respond.

"It was exciting down to that last second finish, and we had to wait several seconds to see the official result," Goodman said.

"Our top five scorers this week were Stephen Forest (7), Irwin Deng (6), Evan Danielson (4), Ryan Keller (3), and then we had 9 students with a 2 – Eddie Wolski is listed fifth so he must have been the fastest of those to finish, but it really was a full team effort. I told the kids right before the match that even if they haven’t been in the top five scores yet, this set of problems is bound to be very challenging (which it was), and a score of 2 or 3 could be the difference maker we need, so take your time, look for a couple of problems you think you might be able to work out, and just try to get a few right," Goodman said.

The other students that earned a 2 were: Eddy Wolski, Grace Osoteo, Rayana Meyers, Jeremy Arch, Randy Jung, Emma Gill, Alex Jasko, Zach Jasko, and Katy Hawkinson.

Goodman told Patch previously that his team was exceptionally deep this year, and powered by a group of grizzled juniors and seniors.

Here's a list of all 24 students that took part in the Finals:

• Jeremy Arch
• Maya Assaf
• Cara Buck
• Evan Danielson
• Irwin Deng
• Eva Ferrari
• Emmet Fink
• Stephen Forest
• Emma Gill
• Katy Hawkinson
• Lauren Hawkinson
• Alex Jasko
• Zach Jasko
• Randy Jung
• Ryan Keller
• Michael Kuban
• Rayana Meyers
• Grace Osoteo
• Cole Patton
• Tommy Polakowski
• Christian Pudelski
• Nick Schulz
• Marguerite Smith
• Eddie Wolski

Photo from Avon Lake Schools