At the beginning of the season, the National Points Race recognized three round robins that could allow competitors to gain points for the race. However, we have decided to add two additional round robins, which will both follow the point distributions for all other round robins besides Montgomery Bell Academy. The first round robin is the Capital City Round Robin, which is 16 person invite-only round robin for extempers in Texas.
The second round robin we will be adding is the Cavalier Challenge, hosted by Durham Academy in North Carolina. This is an invite-only round robin, inviting the country’s best extempers to compete in rounds including 20 minute prep round and a round in which competitors can choose who they would like to compete against, or “challenge”. Given that this is the first year that this round robin is occurring, it will follow the same point distributions as other round robins in the National Points Race this year. However, considering the selective nature of this tournament leading to particularly strong competition, depending on the quality of judging this year, we will consider changing point distributions for the Cavalier Challenge for our National Points Race next year.
Finally, as we have stated throughout the season, we aim to reward extempers for excelling and for conducting a friendly competition between the highest-caliber competitors the nation has to offer with the National Points Race. In order to prioritize fairness for all competitors across the country, we continue to look for ways to level the playing field for all competitors without giving an edge to particular geographical locations. Considering this and the number of entries at the University of Texas Longhorn Classic, we have decided that the University of Texas Longhorn Classic will be counted as a Tier 4 tournament for the National Points Race from this year onwards. As a result, competitors at the Longhorn Classic this year will be awarded points according the distributions for a Tier 4 tournament.
The updated methodology for the National Points Race can be found here.
Happy holidays, and keep an eye out for the December update for the National Points Race early in January, followed by results from MBA.
One reply on “National Points Race 2020-21 Update: Additional Round Robins and UT Longhorn Classic Points Reallocation”
[…] The first weekend in December marked a busy weekend for the circuit, with three tournaments – The UT Longhorn Classic, The GMU Patriot Games, and the Princeton Classic – occurring simultaneously, wrapping up the calendar year 2020. The points for each tournament were given based off their respective tier as per usual. However, the tiers of both GMU and UT were changed mid-season. To read the reasoning behind the switch for GMU, click here. To read the reasoning behind the switch for UT, click here. […]