Last week was the first competition of the year, and oh boy do we have a breakdown for you!
Let’s start at the beginning of the event for most people, Friday. CANs woke up bright and early, arriving at the event at about 7:30 in the morning. They loaded into the stands or the pit, based on their job, and got ready to get the robot up and running for qualifications, of which there were many (72 matches). From 9:00 to 10:15, our team participated in practice matches, where we got to see our robot in action against other robots. After that, the opening ceremonies allowed spectators to learn more about the rules so we could get started with qualifications. For about an hour, qualifications ran without interruption, and we got to gauge the strength of the other teams for scouting and alliances later on. We moved to lunch, where we got to eat some Chik-fil-A lunches to refuel. After that, we continued the matches for 6 and a half hours, recording them to make sure we know what we’re up against, and with, during elims. After the matches for that day had finished, the students migrated to Anderson to discuss strategy and eat dinner. The scouters met up to discuss the notes that they took, and we compiled a list of the teams we want in our alliance, whether asking them or being asked by them.
The CANs met up at Vandergrift for another early morning, arriving at the same time they did the day before. Pits opened shortly after, and the assigned members went over there to present some team info to passerbys. We had another round of opening ceremonies a little bit later to inform spectators of the rules before competition started. After that, we finished up qualifications, which took about an hour or two.
Then the moment the CANs had been fearing came: Alliance Selection. One by one, teams in a descending rank 1st-8th got to pick a partner, before going back up the line, from 8th-1st. The top teams got to choose other teams within the 8, and we were 7th. Our teammates were Orange Dynamite and the Elektrabots, two teams who had been just below 8th before the voting started. Orange Dynamite provided an excellent low goal player, being able to grab balls from the back and front of the arena and bring them to the center, able to be grabbed by us or our other team member. The Elekrabots gave us hangar points, which helped to combat a weak point we had in our robot.
We thought about the other alliances and our own at lunch, so we could debrief while we eat. After that, it was straight to elims, where teams could actually get eliminated in a playoff against another team. We won our first round against a team we had a longstanding rivalry with, and cheers erupted from the CANs. The team we were up against has a very long history with us, and with the picks that they got early on it was looking pretty dreary. The team sat in anticipation waiting for the next round, where we would see if we would tie or not, and you could feel the anxiety in the stands. Next round we played in, we were unfortunately defeated by our assigned team and needless to say we were bummed out. However, we still had one more shot to make it to semifinals and this upcoming round was it. During the match, our robot scored countless goals, racking up a large score against our opponents. However, not one of our robots were able to climb to the top notch of the hangar to win the match. And, since two of our opponents robots were able to, uncertainty writhed in the crowd come the end of the match. As we watched the airplane displaying the winning colors of the match fly across the large display in the center of the venue, our excitement was crushed. We lost to a tiebreaker, because although us and the rival team had the same amount of points, hangar points were worth more in deciding the victorious team, meaning this was an opponent victory.
After that, we finished watching the matches, including the semis and final round, then packed up our robot, as well as the materials we had in the pit. We bagged it all up, put it in the trailer, and drove back to Anderson, ideas in mind. We ran to the lab, unpacked our storage in the truck and ran to the drawing board. We looked at the footage from our matches and contemplated the downfalls we ran into, the successes we had, and things we realized dominated the game in other teams. We can guarantee, there will be improvements made to our robot by Amarillo next week. Excited to see you there!
Well, that was our rather lengthy breakdown of the Austin event. We’re excited to see you guys again soon for the Amarillo event with another breakdown! With that, I bid you adieu.
ausTIN CANs, OUT!
