Laguna Hills Squad Says Smart Money’s On Them

After two days of mind-bending tests, quizzes, speeches and interviews, the Laguna Hills High School Academic Decathlon team was among the top contenders when competition concluded Saturday at the national championship for America’s smartest teens.

Laguna Hills, representing California, failed in its bid to win Saturday’s final event, the Super Quiz, a fast-paced, multiple-choice exam that pits teams head to head. But the 600-point difference between Laguna Hills and the winners of the Super Quiz, the state champions from Arizona and Massachusetts, left the Orange County team well within reach of the national title.

The winning team will be announced today at an awards banquet at the Des Moines Marriott. The champions will be treated to a White House visit Thursday, when they will be personally congratulated by President Bush.

“If you finish in the top five in the Super Quiz, an overall win is certainly within your grasp,” said Laguna Hills coach Roger Gunderson after the 90-minute quiz, which was nationally televised by Iowa public television from the Des Moines Convention Center. “We came in third in the Super Quiz in the state (championship), and we still came back to win it.”

The official standings were not released after the event, although Gunderson said Laguna Hills finished in the top four in the Super Quiz. Overall standings also were kept secret by U.S. Academic Decathlon officials.

Laguna Hills team captain Jeff McCombs, an 18-year-old senior, said that despite the team’s showing in the Super Quiz, he remained confident that the nine-man squad will be on its way to Washington later this week.

Other teams “may have been extremely strong in their state competitions in the Super Quiz and weak in other areas,” he said. “We do well in the Super Quiz, but it’s not our strongest area.”

The Super Quiz was the last event in the Academic Decathlon, which tested students from 38 states and the District of Columbia in essay-writing, interviewing and speech skills in the subjects of social science, science, mathematics, economics, language, and literature and fine arts. The Super Quiz was the only event in which students competed head to head.

In the final event, the teams were split into three groups based on grade-point average and given five multiple-choice questions each on Native American history and affairs, with seven seconds to answer each question. A correct answer was worth 200 points.

McCombs and juniors Jay Kim, 16, and Ryan Sakamoto, 16, were the “A” group. The “B” group was seniors Mike Lee, 17, and Jack Dietz, 17, and junior Todd Faurot, 16. The “C” group was made up of seniors Julian Kingston, Jeff DeWit and Bill Fischer, all 17 years old.

In the Super Quiz, they were tested on questions such as: “The last sustained Indian uprising in the United States was led by (a) Chief Joseph, (b) Blackhawk, (c) Cochise, (d) Geronimo or (e) Crazy Horse.” (Geronimo is the right response.)

Among those in the audience at the Super Quiz was a contingent of about 30 Laguna Hills parents, relatives and school administrators who made the journey from Orange County to see the boys in action.

“Whether they win or lose, it won’t be because they didn’t try,” said Jim DeWit, father of Jeff. “They did their best, and that’s all we can ask. But on the other hand, we’re still keeping our fingers crossed.”

Laguna Hills scored 25 correct answers, for 5,000 points, in the Super Quiz. It was not known how many points the team scored in the other events, although team members for the most part expressed confidence when questioned after each test Friday and Saturday.

Kingston, who scored a perfect 5-for-5 on the Super Quiz, emerged from his personal interview Friday pumping his hands and grinning broadly. “It was amazing--one guy (judge) was nodding, another guy was applauding,” he said. “I think they liked it.”