McLean's Championship Quiz Bowl Team Honored By Fairfax County Board

MCLEAN, VA — Fairfax County Board of Supervisors presented a resolution at its meeting on Tuesday recognizing the McLean High School Quiz Bowl team's victory in the Virginia High School League State Championship Scholastic Bowl.

The Highlanders defeated perennial favorite Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology to claim the championship trophy during the state tournament on Feb. 24.

"It's wonderful to see a group that really put your brains to work, went out there and won a championship," said Dranesville Supervisor Jimmy Bierman, who read the board proclamation recognizing the team's achievement. "Your trivia knowledge will come in handy for decades, I promise you, at parties, at bars and trivia nights. But beyond that, I will say that I really appreciate that you all have taken that time to exercise in some ways, the most important part of your body, your brain."

McLean Quiz Bowl Co-Captain Andrew Evans thanked the team's parents for raising them to be knowledge seekers. He also thanked their teachers and coaches fro teaching them that knowledge and for helping them to implement that knowledge in order to perform in competition. All of that support plus the commitment of team members, prepared McLean to break Thomas Jefferson's long string of state Quiz Bowl championships.

"TJ has been almost an unstoppable force for the greater part of the past five centuries of Quiz Bowl," Evans joked. "This year, it wasn't easy. We did work very hard. ... It was very much a challenge for us to be able to go head-to-head with a school specifically catered to the greatest minds Fairfax County has to offer. But I'm proud to say that as a team, we were able to step up to that challenge and gain the victory that we've worked for, for so long."

In addition to Evans, the championship team included fellow co-captains Clara Marks and Carter Pisocky, along with senior Andrew Norway, juniors Fern Fang, Ryan McKenzie and Angelika Tzioumis, sophomores Edward Burros, Sam Cohen and Eddie Lin and freshman Raghav Kuruba. The team was led by coach Jeff Brocketti and assistant coach Lindsay Benedict.