A Funny thing happened in the UIL Area Contests

Topics and polls that cover the overall marching band activity

Moderators: Trumpet Man 05, malletphreak, Hostrauser, instrumental director

Post Reply
JLGORMAN
Section Leader
Section Leader
Posts: 757
Joined: Sat Jun 28, 2003 7:35 pm
Location: Killeen, TX

A Funny thing happened in the UIL Area Contests

Post by JLGORMAN » Sun Oct 30, 2016 1:59 pm

Saturday the 29th of Oct was throughout TX UIL Area Contest Day, with BAnds competing to advance to the UIL State Marching Championships on 7-9 Nov. The 9th of Nov has been added as a possible date for the 6A Finals if to many Bands qualify for the judges to complete their reviews by 6 PM at night. Last years 5A contest went until past 11 PM and the schools were not happy. This year UIL bowing to pressure decided to add Wednesday morning the 9th of Nov as a possible 6A Finals contest day.To Bands not traveling to BOA Grand Nationals on the 9 of Nov, this is not a major problem, but in the case of Claudia Taylor Johnson, this was a major problem. It should be noted that Ronald Reagan and Leander are also BOA bound but apparently were not flying out until Thursday the 10th. Cedar Park which is also going is a 5A Band and does not compete in UIL this fall.

CTJ decided to consider only performing in the UIL Prelims and seeing how they would place in the Prelims Ordinals. If they were first or second they would consider competing to advance to State.

The Area D Contest was held in Round Rock, home of some extremely strong Bands in the prelims under the Ordinals system, here is what happened.

Ronald Reagan 11 2,1,4,1,3
James Bowie, Aus 13 3,2,2,5,1
Round Rock 16 1,3,6,2,4
Hendrickson, Ffl 24 6,5,3,4,6
CT Johnson 25 5,7,8,3,2
Cedar Ridge 30 9,9,1,6,5

CT Johnson qualified to perform in the Area Finals, however looking at the Judges they would see again, they opted to not compete in finals after being selected for Finals. Thus they did not appear in the Finals, which was most unusual for a UIL Area Contest.

By not competing in Finals, they gave the chance of being advanced to the UIL State Marching Contest. I understand that they are more enthused by BOA than UIL however this leaves me to wonder, if they did not want to got to State, why go to the Area Contest. Many Bands, such as Longview, Nacoogdoches, and other Military Bands do not go on to area contest. Why did they . Best of luck to them at BOA SA and GN

Other interesting developments.
AREA H, this new Primarily Central San Antonio and North Austin(yes folks that is gerrymandering in the Band World. The Schools in San Antonio were not enthused about facing Reagan, Churchill, CTJ Etc,out of the Northeast ISD so they were sent 65 miles north to Round Rock. The Leander Cedar Park schools were sent 65 miles south to San Antonio. The folks from Leander were not good visiter. The top 4 slots for the advancement to State all came from the same school system, Leander and Cedar Park, which by the Way had the top 4 Bands in the 5A State Championships. So much for gerrymandering.

Kudos to the 700 man Allen Eagle Escadrille. They finished 9th in the Prelims at the Area B Contest, beating 14 COMPETITIVE BANDS who compete frequently. Allen finished 8th in the Area Finals. A great story of a Band that can be competitive with 700 kids.

Also the Area B Contest brought back two Big Rivals, Duncanville and LD Bell to gether. They usually only competed against each other in the State Marching Contest. However this fall District 20 which Duncanville belongs to was moved to Area B from its previous Home in Area C. Duncanville beat LD Bell both in Prelims 1st vs 2nd and Finals, 2nd VS 3rd. Keller won the Area. All will compete in San Antonio at UIL SMC.
Deep in the Heart of Texas. Home of the III Mobile Armored Corps and the 1st Cavalry Division, serving America in Iraq

Post Reply