IMSA

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IMSA Titans
IMSALogo.png
Location:
Aurora, Illinois
Coaches Michael Kolton
State Championships 1989 IHSA, 1990 IHSA, 1994 IHSA, 1996 IHSA, 1997 IHSA, 1998 IHSA, 1999 IHSA, 2001 IHSA, 2011 IHSA, 2012 Masonic, 2012 IHSA, 2013 IHSA, 2013 NAQT, 2015 Masonic
Program Status Active
School Size Unknown
NAQT Page link

The Illinois Math and Science Academy (IMSA) is a 3-year public residential high school located in Aurora, Illinois. It is open exclusively to residents of the state of Illinois, based on a competitive application process.

As of 2012, IMSA has won more IHSA State Championships (11 of the 26 since 1987) in Scholastic Bowl than any school. It ended its longest drought (10 years without a title) by winning the 2011 IHSA State Championship Tournament, which turned out to be the first of four consecutive titles won under Coach Noah Prince. After finishing 4th and 3rd, respectively, in the 2015 and 2016 IHSA State tournaments, IMSA won the tournament in 2017, knocking out the likes of Stevenson in the process.

The school has no conference affiliation. It competes in Class AA, the "large school" division, of the Illinois High School Association's State Championship Series. Its nickname is the Titans.

History

IMSA has had at least 13 coaches since 1989. The current coach is Michael Kolton.

After its first state title in 1989, IMSA did not play again until the start of the 1990 IHSA State Series. At the time, winning the state title required winning a five round Sectional, and then winning a four round State Championship Tournament. IMSA went 9-0, and remains the only undefeated State Champion in Illinois history.

Over the course of its 12 State Championship Tournament appearances, IMSA racked up an impressive 34-5 record. Quincy Senior is the only team to have defeated them in an actual championship match. Stevenson is the only team to defeat them twice (opening round elimination in 2000, and in pool play in 2001). Bloomington is the only other team to eliminate IMSA in an opening round match (1991), with a loss to Hinsdale Central in the 1992 semifinals being the only other loss the school has suffered in the tournament.

IMSA's lack of success in the 2000s occurred at the conjunction of several notable events. First, their last State Title before then was the last year non-pyramidal questions were in predominant use in the State Series. At the same time, Wheaton North began to rise as a power, and as the schools were now in the same Sectional Tournament, IMSA found itself unable to defeat the improved Falcons from Wheaton.

Under coach Czerny, IMSA developed a reputation for no-showing and being late, in addition to rarely playing good quizbowl. Although IMSA has been known in the past to support and play bad quizbowl, after Dr. Noah Prince took over the program at the start of the 2009-2010 season, the quizbowl program has received a revival, embracing good quizbowl and winning good tournaments.

In the 2010-2011 season, despite losing noted IMSA quizbowler Bonny Jain, the team emerged from the shambles to becoming a top 20 team (according to the Fred Morlan rankings) in the nation. This was due to a coordinated mass study binge during the summer by the "Original" IMSA A consisting of juniors Webster Guan, Adam Kalinich, Nolan Maloney, and Eric Ordonez. Due to this meteoric rise, the team also ended their 10-year IHSA state title drought with a 1st place finish at the State tournament by defeating both Auburn and Stevenson. They set the records for most points scored at the state finals and most season losses by a state champion. After a season of finishing mostly 4th place in Illinois quizbowl tournaments, they went on to place T-13th at HSNCT. At the 2012 NSC, the team of Webster, Eric, and sophomores Sabrina Lato and Saieesh Rao settled for a disappointing 25th place, mainly due to the absence of Adam and Nolan.

The 2011-2012 season was the senior season of the "Original" IMSA A. During the season, they would share tournament wins with Lloyd Sy and Abid Haseeb's Rockford Auburn team as well as Loyola. IMSA would win the majority of tournaments in Illinois that year, capturing 1st place finishes in Earlybird, Wheaton North IHSSBCA Kickoffs, NTV ELEGANT, Ultima, Midwest Championship, and Wildcat in addition to placing T-3rd at ACF Fall at NIU, 3rd at Loyburn, 2nd at Auburn's Harvard Fall Mirror, T-2nd at Huskie Bowl, and 2nd at NAQT State. Auburn and IMSA would develop some sort of a rivalry, as the two teams would literally trade wins throughout the season, with Auburn ending with a slight regular season edge of 6-5. However, IMSA would defeat Auburn in an HSNCT Prelims match and a PACE top bracket playoffs match to gain the overall edge of 7-6. In terms of the Illinois State championships, IMSA would take two of the three state titles, defending their IHSA title and capturing the Masonic championship for the first time in school history. After a disappointing T-13th finish at the 2012 HSNCT (in which an Atlantic Charter/14 points hose eliminated them), they would redeem themselves by going 13-4 and capturing 4th place at the 2012 PACE NSC, tying them with 2011 Stevenson for the highest NSC finish at the time by an Illinois team.

The 2011-12 season would also mark the rise of IMSA B as an emerging Illinois powerhouse, led by Anton Karpovich, Saieesh Rao, Sabrina Lato, and Siva Gangavarapu. They would capture T-21st at both the 2012 HSNCT and 2012 PACE NSC. In 2012-2013, after the graduation of the Original IMSA A, they would become the new IMSA A. During the season, they would consistently finish behind Belvidere North and Loyola (although sometimes capturing victories over the other two) in Illinois regular season. However, they would capture IMSA's first ever NAQT State Championship and three-peat in IHSA, winning the 2013 IHSA State Championship. They also won tournaments such as Niles West Varsity, Huskie Bowl, and ATROPHY in this year.At the 2013 HSNCT, they would also top their predecessors by finishing T-5th.

The IMSA B of 2012-2013 also played decently, although it did not continue the stellar legacy of the previous IMSA B. It had a great start winning the Wake Up Call III at Northwestern with its original lineup of Waleed Ali,Daniel Pechi,Rajiv Patel O'Connor, and Daniel Collins. However, after that tournament it mostly placed in the middle of the pack or outside of the top bracket. This may have been due to the loss of history powerhouse Waleed Ali and Daniel Collins, who were replaced by Andrew Salij and former A team member Saieesh Rao. At the 2013 HSNCT, IMSA B placed T-73rd after losing its first playoff match to Sycamore.

In the fall of 2014, Noah Prince resigned as head coach. Michael Kolton was appointed head coach, with Dr. Prince staying on as an assistant coach. Having finished second or third in most major tournaments (including a fourth place finish at IHSA State after a loss to Fremd), the team was ranked 17th in Morlan rankings going into nationals. However, the team, consisting of Andrew Salij, Waleed Ali, Dan Pechi, Pranav Sivakumar, and Nathaniel Smith, finished 4th at HSNCT, losing in the semifinals to eventual champions Arcadia.

In 2016, IMSA, led by Mike Etzkorn, finished 3rd in most tournaments, similarly to the previous year. However, mostly due to the absence of Nathaniel Smith, the team finished in T-17th place at PACE NSC. The team also took T-53rd at HSNCT, mainly due to the absence of Pranav Sivakumar.

IMSANITY

IMSANITY is a question set written by IMSA, beginning in the school year 2010-2011. Since then, it has gone through four iterations, with the third one being known as LIMSANITY due to the addition of question writers Morgan Venkus and Ian Torres from Loyola Academy. IMSANITY is notable for having math questions that take up a substantial portion of the question distribution (3/3 in first iteration,1.5/1.5 thereafter). IMSANITY has often been hosted at TRIUMVIR at Metea Valley High School and at BMI in Bloomington, Illinois. IMSANITY was discontinued after Dr. Prince's resignation as coach in the 2014-15 season.

2016-17 season

Having graduated its leading scorer, IMSA was not expected to perform well in the 2016-17 season. However, thanks to extensive studying by Pranav Sivakumar and contributions from Nathaniel Smith, Hanson Hao, Shivani Sharma, and Becky Mathew, the team has had several creditable finishes this season, usually taking 3rd place. In addition to winning the IHSA State Tournament, IMSA has defeated Naperville North three times, knocking them out of all three state tournaments (with half of A team at NAQT State). IMSA is currently ranked 20th in Morlan rankings and is hoping to perform well at both nationals this year.

IHSSBCA Individual Awards

Playing for Team Illinois

All State Selections

All Sectional Selections

Noted Team Achievements

Nationals

NAQT State

  • Champions: 2013, 2014
  • 2nd Place: 2012
  • 3rd Place: 2015

Masonic State

  • Champions: 2012 (AA), 2014 (AA), 2015 (3A)
  • 3rd Place: 2011, 2013, 2016, 2017
  • 4th Place: 2010

IHSA State Series

  • Champions: 1989-90, 1994, 1996-1999, 2001, 2011-2014, 2017
  • Runner-Up: 1993
  • 3rd Place: 1992, 2010, 2016
  • 4th Place: 2015
  • Sectional Championships: 1989-95, 1996-2001, 2010-2017
  • Regional Championships: 2001, 2004, 2005, 2008, 2010-2017

Notable Alumni


IHSA State Championship

1987-91
Quincy (1987) · Quincy (1988) · IMSA (1989) · IMSA (1990) · Centralia (1991)
Class AA (1992-present)
Hinsdale Central (1992) · Quincy (1993) · IMSA (1994) · Richwoods (1995) · IMSA (1996) · IMSA (1997) · IMSA (1998) · IMSA (1999) · Stevenson (2000) · IMSA (2001) · Wheaton North (2002) · Wheaton North (2003) · Wheaton North (2004) · Stevenson (2005) · Fremd (2006) · New Trier (2007) · Auburn (2008) · Carbondale (2009) · IMSA (2010) · IMSA (2011) · IMSA (2012) · IMSA (2013) · IMSA (2014) · Auburn (2015) · Hinsdale Central (2016) · IMSA (2017) · Stevenson (2018) · University Lab (2019)
Class A (1992-present)
Illinois NAQT State Champion
Preceded by
Year
Succeeded by
Auburn
2013, 2014
Auburn
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