News

St. Jago slips past Rusea's

By ANDREA DOWNER, Staff Reporter

Members of the winning St. Jago team. - Carlington Wilmot

ST. JAGO HIGH barely squeezed past Rusea's High School to advance to the third round of the TVJ School's Challenge Quiz last night.

The two teams were evenly matched and this was evident throughout the fast paced contest. At the end of the first round, both teams were neck and neck with 8 points each. A query by St. Jago's head coach, Frank Weise, before the start of the second section however, resulted in his team gaining an additional point which brought their score to 9.

After consultation, the judges agreed that St. Jago's response of indict for a word beginning with 'in' that means 'to be charged with a crime' could be accepted. The judges answer to that question had been incriminate.

Rusea's continued to nip close on the heels of St. Jago in the second section which ended with St. Jago on 20 and Rusea's on 18 points.

Both teams committed a few blunders however, when they failed to answer correctly, some questions that could be described as general knowledge. The Spanish Town team did not know that Hyacinth Bennett is the head of the newly formed human rights group, Jamaicans for Action. They also failed to name the head of the Bureau of Standards, Dr. Omer Thomas. However, they were able to state the West Indies Cricket team's losing score against England in their first match of the test series. The correct answer being 47.

Horror of horrors! Rusea's was not able to correctly state when ousted Haitian president, Bertrand Aristide arrived in Jamaica. They felt it was February 22, the judges advised them that it was in fact March 15.

In the third section, where the buzzer ruled, the slip ups, albeit fewer, continued. Neither team was able to name Clive Dobson as the President of the National Workers Union. When that question was asked, the buzzers stayed silent.

St. Jago, prevailed however, and ended the match with 26 points to Rusea's 24. After the match, Weise shared his perception of his team's win.

"It was a very close match, but I think the team was a little bit unnerved. However, they managed to pull it off," he stated.

He said there are some clear lessons that his team had to learn from the experience.

Monique Stewart, head coach for Rusea's admitted that she was disappointed at her team's loss.

"We came with a mindset to win, the students worked long and hard. Unfortunately, they did not carry the winning spirit right through the series," she concluded.

The St. Jago team was lead by Vanetta Ranger, their captain, the other members were, Shakera Campbell, Ralston Mckenzie and Shane Edwards.

Rusea's team comprised Orain Hibbert, captain, Orayne Dallas, Shendon Whytle and Marvin Jowrey.