University of Illinois Lab
| University of Illinois Laboratory High School | |
| |
|---|---|
| Location: Urbana, IL | |
| Club Presidents | Tim Cho |
| Coaches | Chris Butler, Brad McLain |
| State Championships | 2015 IHSA (A) 2018 NAQT 2018 Masonic (AA) |
| National Championships | None |
| National Appearances | HSNCT: 2014, 2015, 2018 SSNCT: 2018 NSC: 2016,2017, 2018 |
| Program Status | Active |
| School Size | 325 students, 20-25 on A, B, and C Teams |
| NAQT Page | link |
University of Illinois Laboratory High School, or "Uni", is a university-funded lab school on the University of Illinois campus in Urbana. It includes a composite year for 7th and 8th grades alongside the standard four years of high school. However, only high school students are allowed to participate in the Scholastic Bowl team due to age restrictions by the IHSA, with the middle school students in a separate middle school team.
The Uni High Scholastic Bowl team was founded in 2013 and has since expanded to include a B team and a C team, with about 20 active members on all teams. The team is coached by John Butler and Brad McLain of the University of Illinois. The de facto captain is Tim Cho, although team members frequently emphasize that there is no true captain and that all members of the team contribute a worthy amount. Uni's A Team is known for having one of the most evenly distributed PP20TUH averages when playing as a four-person team, with all four players around 40-50 PPG on a regular-difficulty high school set.
Although the school is called "Uni High" throughout the Champaign-Urbana area, teams from other parts of the state tend to refer to it as "Uni Lab", "U of I Lab", or "Urbana Lab School". It is sometimes mistakenly referred to as "U-High", an unrelated school in Normal, IL. Since the 2017-18 school year, the team has been referred to as "Snake Farm", a play on the "State Farm Center" in Champaign.
In 2015, Uni won the Class A IHSA State Championship. Because of the IHSA's success factor policies, Uni was moved up to class AA because it is a selective-admissions school, despite having only 320 students. The team placed second at the 2017 class AA tournament, losing to IMSA 500-320 in the championship round after beating Carbondale, Auburn, and OPRF.
In 2018, a team comprised of Tim Cho, Ethan Ashbrook, Dylan Bowman, and Jonathan Lau won the NAQT Illinois State Championship by defeating Auburn in an advantaged final 350-320, finishing out the tournament with a 12-1 record. Uni became the very first school south of Interstate 80 to win the event. With only about 320 students, it also became the smallest ever school to win a large school or open division tournament in Illinois. While defending champion, Stevenson, was not present because of poor weather, Uni also became the first team to win the championship with all four starters posting over 20 PP20TUH for the tournament.
The team plans to attend the 2018 SSNCT and HSNCT.
Team Members
Ethan Ashbrook (10)
Dylan Bowman (10)
Tim Cho (11)
Jonathan Lau (9)
Reed Phillips (12)
Daniel Cho (9)
Henry Kraatz (10)
Aryan Lalwani (9)
Robert Nagel (11)
Nicholas Phillips (9)
Sasha Rushing (10)
Srijan Shukla (9)
Matthew Tang (10)
Romaisa Aamer (9)
Maher Adoni (9)
Martin Dalling (11)
Lia Dankowicz (11)
Zachary Donnini (9)
Maddie Harden (10)
Arav Jagroop (9)
Caitlin Mamaril (9)
Sam Polonus (10)
Noah Rebei (9)
Lawrence Taritsa (11)
Lucas Wood (9)
Joanna Yoo (9)
Notable Tournament Performance
2015 IHSA State Champions, Class A
2017 IHSA State Runner-Up, Class AA (moved from Class A in 2016)
2017 Masonic State Runner-Up, Class AA
2018 NAQT Illinois State Champions
2018 Masonic State Champions, Class AA
External Links
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