Seneca Valley Students Qualify for National Academic Games Tournament

Twenty members of the Seneca Valley Academic Games team have qualified for the national Academic Games tournament after a regional equations competition in October.

The Division team was separated into two groups at the regional competition. Students from both groups placed in the tournament.

Mark Livingstone, Siona Sharma, Rhea Kudtarkar, Emily Winterhalter and Ally Veverka took second place. Samantha Logan, Ryan Murtagh, Urvi Gupta, Sara Panetta and Natalie McKinley placed third.

Ally Veverka, Kyle Cindrich and Urvi Gupta had perfect scores. With Natalie McKinley, Rhea Kudtarkar, Emily Winterhalter, Dan Popp and Sammi Logan, the students achieved scores at the competition that earned them one of the two qualifications they needed to move to the national level.

The Academic Games team also competed against students from districts within the Pittsburgh region to take first, second, third and fifth places at the equations tournament.

Students on the first-place team are Shane Conklin, Alex Garcia, Ryan Stelitano, Troy Fisher and Timmy Tierney. Students on the second-place team are Taryn Beegle, Katie Johnson, Sarah Donnelly, Rachel Winterhalter and Gabe Demetter.

The third-place team includes Andrew Funovits, Jason Moore, Nate Desing, Matt Kraynik and Joe Palaski.

The fifth-place team includes Nivya Patel, Sydney Goepfert, Josh Rupert, Matt Ehret and Alex Dixon.

The Junior Division Team of freshmen and sophomore students took second place. Sophomores Elliot Burr, Nikko Paserba, Jeremiah Scanlan and Sam West had national qualifying scores.

The Senior Division Team of juniors and seniors also took second place. Jason Chickness and Jonathan Selling had national qualifying scores.

The Academic Games National Tournament will be April 27 in West Virginia.