By Ahmed Mori
Originally published in the White Plains Patch
It’s not everyday you walk away from a battle of wits with a $10,000 check that needs its own seat on the train ride home. For the White Plains High School academic team, however, winning the 2011 Tri-State Challenge Championship seemed like a routine win in the course of a marvelous season that tallied another 109.
“It’s weird to think that winning [the tournament] is out of the ordinary,” said junior Eric Smiley, 17, regarding the televised victory. “We don’t base our whole year off this win.”
Smiley’s teammates agree. Despite watching each of their wins throughout the course of the tournament on MSG Varsity’s fourteenth annual “The Challenge” TV quiz show for the last three months—the eclectic bunch admitted the real reward lies in the pleasure of competing.
“For a weird bunch of people who know a bunch of random things, we have fun,” said junior and current team captain Adam Jaffe, 17, who plans to compete again next year.
The varsity academic team, known simply as the “A-team”, is indeed jovial on their downtime. For instance, for the group’s annual “Night at the Movies” end-of-year celebration, they settled on “Spinal Tap,” and their sense of camaraderie is evidenced by rapid-fire quips and inside jokes.
Ahmed Mori 