Patrick Liao

Patrick Liao
Noted subjects	History (esp. Canadian and First World War), Classics, Geography, Current Events
Current college	N/A
Past colleges	University of Pennsylvania (2012-2015)
High school	Lisgar (2008-2011)
Stats	HDWhite • NAQT

Patrick Liao is a Canadian quizbowler who formerly played for the University of Pennsylvania and Lisgar. He was part of the 2015 ACF Nationals championship team along with Eric Mukherjee, Saajid Moyen, and Chris Chiego, and was the first Canadian to win an the ACF Division I title. In high school he was the alternate on the 2008 Reach for the Top championship winning team, and captained Lisgar to a 3rd place finish in the 2011 Reach for the Top nationals.

Career

High School

Reach for the Top

Patrick began playing Reach for the Top at Lisgar in grade 9, where after the Edmontago crisis he went to Reach for the Top Nationals as a spare on a powerful team that defeated UTS to be national champion. The following year saw him be on the A-team as a regular, as Lisgar tied for first at regionals and came in the top 10 at provincials. In Patrick's grade 11 year, he captained a Lisgar team consisting of three other grade 11s and a grade 10 to first in Ottawa regionals. However, that year Lisgar's long streak of playoff appearances at the Ontario Reach provincials was ended when Lisgar was seeded in a tough pool in which it went 5-2.

In his senior year, Lisgar swept the Ottawa regionals, and was seeded 2nd going into the playoffs. Patrick's Lisgar team was eliminated in a semifinal game against UTS, which led to Patrick jubilantly exclaiming that he never had to play Reach again. (Un)fortunately, Patrick's successful protest (resolved post-tournament) that "de la Salle" should have been accepted for "René-Robert Cavalier" and a team from another province dropping meant that Lisgar made the national finals. At nationals, Patrick captained the team to a third-place finish when Lisgar lost to Centennial Collegiate Vocational Institute (CCVI), that year's Ontario champions, in the semi-finals.

Quizbowl

Patrick's first quizbowl tournament was the 2007 Ottawa Quizbowl tournament, in which he was the second-top scorer and his Lisgar C team came third. Patrick played on the Lisgar team that made HSNCT in 2009, 2010, 2011, although he only went to the first two because he went to PACE NSC in 2011. He also captained a team that won the 2010 Ontario Provincial NAQT championships. Patrick is infamous for answering "Daniel Carter" for "Jimmy Carter" at a tournament. Daniel was the captain of Lisgar's rivals, Centennial Collegiate Vocational Institute.

College

At Penn, Patrick instead became notorious for writing about Canada inordinately for submissions and for helping the team to a fourth-place finish at ACF Nationals 2012. His depth of knowledge in history, classics and Canadiana helped Penn to several top four finishes during his tenure.

Patrick helped the team win the 2015 ACF Nationals as a senior, making him the first Canadian player to win ACF Nationals. The shining pinnacle of Patrick's quizbowl career was tossup 20 of the final against Chicago; Patrick achieved a spectacular buzz on the On-to-Ottawa trek, thus bringing his UG career full circle, it having started with him writing a near-impossible question on the same topic (directed to do so by Eric Mukherjee) as a freshman.

Writing and editing

• 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 Penn Bowls
• 2012 Penn-ance
• BLASTOISE
• IHBB Canada 2015 - Canadian content

Notable Tournaments

• 2015 ACF Nationals - 1st place (with Saajid Moyen, Chris Chiego, and Eric Mukherjee)
• 2015 NAQT ICT - 2nd place (with Saajid Moyen, Chris Chiego, and Eric Mukherjee)
• 2014 ACF Nationals - 3rd place (with Saajid Moyen, Dallas Simmons, and Eric Mukherjee)
• 2014 NAQT ICT - 3rd place (with Saajid Moyen, Dallas Simmons, and Eric Mukherjee)
• 2014 College History Bowl - 3rd place (with Dallas Simmons, Eric Mukherjee, and David Ferguson)
• 2013 MUT at Yale - 1st place (with James Lasker and David Xu)
• 2013 TIT at Maryland - 2nd place (with Eric Mukherjee, Saajid Moyen, and David Xu)
• 2013 ACF Regionals at Brown - 1st place (with Eric Mukherjee, Saajid Moyen, and Dallas Simons)
• 2012 QUARK Mid-Atlantic Mirror - 1st place (with Eric Mukherjee, Saajid Moyen, and Dallas Simons)
• 2012 IFT at Yale - Tied for 2nd place (with Saajid Moyen)
• 2012 ACF Nationals - 4th place (with Saajid Moyen, Eric Mukherjee, and James Lasker)
• 2012 MUT - 2nd place (with Saajid Moyen)
• 2012 ICT - 11th place (with Saajid Moyen, Eric Mukherjee, James Lasker, and Samuel Passaglia)
• 2012 ACF Regionals - 3rd place (with Saajid Moyen, Eric Mukherjee, James Lasker, and Samuel Passaglia)
• 2012 SCT Mid-Atlantic - 2nd place (with Saajid Moyen, Eric Mukherjee, Samuel Passaglia, and Jon Moller)
• 2011 MAGNI - 3rd place (with Saajid Moyen, Eric Mukherjee, and James Lasker)