2007 IHSA State Championship Tournament
The 2007 Illinois High School Association (IHSA) State Championship Tournaments ended the twenty-first State Championship Series conducted in Scholastic Bowl by the IHSA. It was the sixiteenth season in which there were separate State Championship Tournaments held for small schools (Class A) and large schools (Class AA). For the eleventh year, both tournaments were held at the Peoria Civic Center.
The tournament was managed by John Rathbun, and equipment furnished by Buzzersystems.com.
Advancement
Teams were assigned to one of eight sectionals within each class. Teams were seeded by the coaches, and teams would then be assigned to one of four Regionals within each Sectional. The winners of the regionals would advance to their respective sectional tournaments, where they would play a three match round robin to determine a winner. The determination of the geographic boundaries of the Sectional was arbitrarily decided by the IHSA Office.
Tournament Format
Each round was comprised of 30 toss-ups and accompanying bonus questions.
In the State Championship Tournament, teams would be randomly assigned to pools of four, and play a three match round robin. The winners of each pool would advance to the Championship Match, and the runners-up in each pool would advance to play for third place. Ties were broken by head-to-head results or total points scored among tied teams (in the event of a three-way tie).
The process of breaking three-way ties was new this year, and had been proposed by Coach Mike Sacks of Homewood-Flossmoor. Sacks' team had taken three losses, but a concern arose when he wanted to play more of his reserves in the third and final pool round, as the team he was playing was still playing for advancement. He felt that it would have been questionably ethical to play his reserve players when he had played starters against the other teams. He felt that by altering the rules in such a way would permit teams in such a position to play reserves without worrying about affecting the outcome of the tournament.
The top four teams earned trophies and medals for team members, coaches, principals, and activities directors.
Questions
For the seventh year, the questions were written by a group of retired coaches and person from other states.
CLASS A
| ||||
| State Champion: | ||||
| Runner-Up: | ||||
| Third Place | ||||
| Fourth Place | ||||
POOL #1
Decatur Lutheran swept through their pool with a 3-0 record. The Latin School went 2-1 to advance to the third place match.
| Round | Winning Team | Score | Losing Team | Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Decatur Lutheran | 395 | Fairfield | 194 |
| Latin School | 301 | Beardstown | 108 | |
| 2 | Latin School | 219 | Fairfield | 214 |
| Decatur Lutheran | 327 | Beardstown | 78 | |
| 3 | Fairfield | 173 | Beardstown | 73 |
| Decatur Lutheran | 230 | Latin School | 192 |
POOL #2
Columbia went 3-0 to advance to the State Championship Match. PORTA went 2-1, and advanced to the third place match.
| Round | Winning Team | Score | Losing Team | Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | PORTA | 217 | Morrison | 145 |
| Columbia | 225 | Macomb | 176 | |
| 2 | PORTA | 249 | Macomb | 103 |
| Columbia | 222 | Morrison | 82 | |
| 3 | Columbia | 170 | PORTA | 132 |
| Macomb | 152 | Morrison | 97 |
Third Place
| Winning Team | Score | Losing Team | Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| PORTA | 187 | Latin School | 135 |
Finals
| Winning Team | Score | Losing Team | Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| Decatur Lutheran | 231 | Columbia | 168 |
CLASS AA
| ||||
| State Champion: | ||||
| Runner-Up: | ||||
| Third Place | ||||
| Fourth Place | ||||
POOL #1
Auburn and Wheaton North both posted 2-1 records, with the round one victory by Wheaton North over Auburn sending Wheaton North to the Championship Match and Auburn to the third place match for the fourth consecutive year. To add to the drama, each of the four teams was 1-1 after two rounds (a first in tournament history).
| Round | Winning Team | Score | Losing Team | Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Carbondale | 334 | Bloomington | 300 |
| Wheaton North | 327 | Auburn | 285 | |
| 2 | Bloomington | 291 | Wheaton North | 290 |
| Auburn | 348 | Carbondale | 211 | |
| 3 | Auburn | 337 | Bloomington | 258 |
| Wheaton North | 356 | Carbondale | 201 |
POOL #2
New Trier swept the pool (3-0) to advance to the Championship Match. Libertyville went 2-1 and advance to play for third place.
| Round | Winning Team | Score | Losing Team | Score |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | New Trier | 340 | Libertyville | 209 |
| Hinsdale Central | 198 | Joliet Township | 182 | |
| 2 | New Trier | 493 | Hinsdale Central | 76 |
| Libertyville | 359 | Joliet Township | 65 | |
| 3 | New Trier | 385 | Joliet Township | 131 |
| Libertyville | 334 | Hinsdale Central | 157 |
Third Place
| Winning Team | Score | Losing Team | Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| Auburn | 279 | Libertyville | 145 |
Finals
| Winning Team | Score | Losing Team | Score |
|---|---|---|---|
| New Trier | 325 | Wheaton North | 218 |
Notes
- Twelve years after their first appearance in the State Championship Match, New Trier finally won a State Title. The Final Match started off very low scoring, but New Trier slowly pulled away on the strength of eight tossups answered by Carlo Angiuli.
- This season marked the first time since 2000 that each State Championship Tournament was won by a team winning their first State Championship.
- One of the top players for Decatur Lutheran was Jonathan Ryherd, whose father was the Principal and mother was the Coach. Far from nepotism, Ryherd was also selected by the coaches of the state as a member of the All-State First Team based on his all-around excellent play for the year.
| ||||||||||||||