1997 NAC

1997 National Academic Championship
Edited by	Questions Unlimited
Champion	Edison
Runner-up	James Island
Third	Altamont
Fourth	Bellaire
High scorer	David Farris (awarded MVP)
Site	Loyola University in New Orleans and Marymount University in Arlington, VA
Field
Stats

This tournament was held at Loyola University in New Orleans from May 29 to June 1, and at Marymount University in Arlington, VA from June 12-15. Teams at each site played four preliminary games, with the top 16 (method of choosing/seeding unknown) advancing to a single-elimination playoff bracket. The winners of the two sites then played each other in an overall championship game.

The final featured James Island losing to Edison on the final tossup, "What is the undiscovered country, from whose bourne no traveler returns?" (James Island interrupted early with an answer of "space"). For reasons known only to Chip Beall, the penultimate tossup of the final was also on a quotation from Hamlet. According to Beall's tournament summary, this was the first NAC final to be decided on the last tossup.

Edison captain David Farris was labeled a tournament-winning "one-man team" by Beall, and named tournament MVP, but for some reason did not gain entrance to the NAC Hall of Fame.

The Edison team had won the New Orleans phase of the tournament, defeating Altamont of Alabama in the finals there, and thus earning free transport to DC for the finals. One of the tournament quarterfinalists was a Manheim Township team that included Jeff Hoppes, who would go on to win both the 2003 ACF Nationals and 2004 and 2006 NAQT ICT in conjunction with Farris on the Berkeley team. Manheim Township lost to Bellaire in the DC semifinals, before Bellaire lost to James Island in the DC final.

The LBJ (Austin, TX) and Plymouth Salem (Canton, MI) teams were named "Rookie of the Year" (best teams making their first NAC appearance, in Beall's opinion).