Truman Quiz Bowl team finishes tremendous season with third-place state finish (updated with names of entire team included)

The Truman High School Quiz Bowl team ended its outstanding season recently with a third-place finish during the state tournament.

The tournament is run on a double-elimination format. Truman competed in the Class A bracket of the tournament.

The Cougars opened competition in the bottom half of the bracket by beating Livonia Stevenson, 330-175. They followed that up with a 260-220 victory over DeWitt.

In the third round, Truman beat Utica, 360-190, which put the Cougars into the final round of the opening day. Detroit Catholic Central and Truman, by that time, were the only remaining unbeaten teams in the tournament. CC has beaten Linden, St. Joseph and Okemos by overwhelming margins headed into the showdown with Truman.

CC beat Truman 405-115, enabling the Shamrocks to advance into the finals. The Cougars dropped into the consolation bracket at that point and had to face Okemos with the winner advancing into the overall finals against CC. 

Okemos had been bounced into the consolation bracket during the third round of the first day, but rebounded to defeat Owosso and Utica. Owosso beat Truman by a single question, 275-265, to elimination the Cougars and drop them into the third-place finish.

CC ended up winning the Class A title. Other state champions crowned during the tournament at Michigan State University were Detroit Country Day School (B) and Hillsdale Academy (C/D). In all, 600 students from 35 counties across Michigan participated in the tournament, which was started by former Senate Majority Leader Dan L. DeGrow 26 years ago. This was the 13th time it was held at MSU.

Retiring Coach Dave McClain's team ended up winning the Southern Wayne Quiz Bowl championship with a perfect 9-0 record this season, and then rolled through the conference tournament with a perfect 3-0 record. It ended up recording over 4,000 points in the 15-team conference, almost twice as many as the second-closer team (Huron).

The team was led by Adam Greene (pictured above this story), who maintains a 4.269 GPA and is the No. 1 Truman Quiz Bowl member in history, according to Coach McClain. Patrick Murray (4.27 GPA) is No. 2 overall in school history. Greene was offered a Michigan State University Honors College scholarship earlier this year.

Greene was named to the All-State team, along with Brandon Roach of CC, Raymond Surya of Holland, Mayank Patke of Okemos and Troy Zuccaro of Utica Academy.

For more about the tournament, click here.

McClain, a retired teacher who spent 38 years in the district, is retiring to spend time with his wife. They plan on traveling a little, but he was remain as a moderator for the conference.

This year's Truman Quiz Bowl Team included seniors Greene, Ike Ibrahim, Jessica Johnsen and Murray; juniors Joe Agne, Noah Eversole and Greg Thomas; sophomores Nick Allen, Zack Ovares, and Sidney Tripp; and freshman Asiel Clark.

For an indepth story on the team's season published earlier this year by The News-Herald Newspapers' Dave Komer, click here.