Blackwater Robotics Team competes at event

Published 5:37 pm Thursday, March 28, 2019

The winning alliance. From left to right are Team 6882 – Fahrenheit Robotics of Fredericksburg; Team 1599 – CircuiTree Robotics of Atlee High School of Mechanicsville; and Team 1610 – Blackwater Robotics of Franklin High School of Franklin. — Submitted

By Brandon Yanna

PORTSMOUTH

The Blackwater Robotics team competed March 16-17 in the FIRST Chesapeake-Hampton Roads event held at Churchland High School in Portsmouth.

After the 12 qualification matches, the team was ranked fourth out of 37 teams.

In alliance selection, the number 2 seeded team, Team1599 – CircuiTree of Atlee High School in Mechanicsville, selected Blackwater and Team 6882 – Fahrenheit Robotics of Fredericksburg, to create the 2nd seed alliance.

In the quarterfinals, the alliance took on the seventh-seeded alliance of Team 977 – CometBots of Halifax

High in South Boston, Team 1793 – Aviators of Norview High, and Team 1908 – ShoreBots of

Northampton High School in Eastville. The second seeded alliance defeated the number 7 alliance in two straight matches with scores of 75-35 and 64-53.

In the semifinals, the Blackwater alliance went against the number 3 alliance of Team 6334 – Aluminati of Midlothian, Team 2998 – VikingBots of Thomas Jefferson High in Richmond, and Team 5279 – Bionic Eagles of Altavista High School. Again, the number 2 alliance defeated the third-seeded alliance in two straight matches with scores of 87-53 and 72-60.

In a surprising finals match-up, the Blackwater alliance went against the number 4 seeded alliance of

Team 2106 – The Junkyard Dogs of Goochland High School, Team 1413 – Skrappy of Bluestone High

School, and Team 5546 A.R.T. of Appomattox Regional Governor’s School. The number 2 alliance

won the event in two straight thrilling matches with scores of 80-67 and 83-61.

Blackwater Robotics will be competing at the FIRST Chesapeake District Championship on April 11-13 at George Mason University in Fairfax.