Evening all. So, not long left in the quizzing calendar; Mastermind is nearly done, and Only Connect's final is next week, which, along with tonight's third place play-off, I shall be giving a full review to later in the week. Just four more UCs left after tonight too; tonight, we welcomed back two teams who might have been among the frontunners for the semis at the start of the QFs, but one would be out tonight; the other would take the third place in the semis.
Wolfson College Oxford beat Sheffield on a tie-break in the first round, comprehensively beat Edinburgh in the second, narrowly lost to Corpus Christi in the preliminaries, before sneaking past Manchester on a 130-each tie-break in the eliminators. They were unchanged from those previous games:
Mike Perrin, from Japan, studying Archaeology
Mary Caple, from Victoria, Canada, studying Art History
Captain: Claire Jones, from Houston, Texas, studying History
Ryan Walker, from Stone in Staffordshire, studying Clinical Medicine
Durham lost their first match to Trinity, came through the play-offs by beating York, trounced Southampton in the first round, beat Jesus in the prelims, before losing their qualifier 185-115 to Imperial. They were also the same four as before:
Charles Bland, from Sutton in Surrey, studying Philosophy
William Tams, from Kirkby Stephen in Cumbria, studying Biosciences
Captain: Joe Cooper, from London, studying Chemistry
Arthur Raffle, from Manchester, studying French and German
Off we set again then, and Mr Raffle opened the scoring for the night by identifying the plaque commemorating the founding of the pre-Raphaelite brotherhood; one single bonus opened the Wearsiders' account. Mr Tams increased their advantage with Ukraine, and the bonuses on magnetism provided two further correct bonuses. A rather complicated maths starter of the sort UC does brilliantly was up next, but neither side had it. A quick buzz from Mr Raffle moved Durham further ahead, and another pair of bonuses followed. The first picture round, on diagrams depicted metabolic pathways, went to Durham; another two correct bonuses took their lead to 75-0.
Ms Jones finally awoke her side on the next starter with 'fricative'; a bonus set on the work of David Hilbert, however, gave them no further points. A quick buzz saw Mr Walker identify the only two elements with a 'V' in their name as Vanadium and Livermorium; another classic UC set of bonuses, on pairs of countries whose English names end in the same two letters, gave the Oxonians a much needed full set. A third starter in a row went to Wolfson thanks to their captain; just the one bonus followed this time. Mr Bland decided that was enough of that, and reawoke Durham with the next starter; the work of Helen Taussig gave the Wearsiders just one bonus this time.
Mr Raffle very quickly took the music starter; the bonuses, on classical pieces inspired by folk melodies, didn't give his side any further bonuses however, leaving their lead at 105-50. It went further up as Mr Raffle took a second starter in a row, giving his side a bonus set on Central Asian history, of which they took just the one bonus. It didn't matter at the moment though, as Mr Cooper took the next starter; a full set of bonuses put them 95 ahead and in firm command going into the final minutes.
The second picture round, on quartets of concurrent holders of the four great offices of state with one missing, went to Durham, after the starter was dropped and Wolfson lost five on a replacement; the Wearsiders took just one bonus, but had now opened up a lead of 160-45. And when Mr Raffle appeared to correctly guess the composer Webern for the next starter, that was definitely game over; one bonus on aircraft followed.
Now it was just a question of how high either side could get. Mr Tams pushed Durham closer to 200 as he took the next starter; bonuses on Scottish ferry points gave just one correct answer, but it was irrelevant now. Mr Raffle took the final starter identifying two of the Irish counties that border Northern Ireland, and the gong cut off their discussion of the final bonus. Durham won 205-45.
A one sided but enjoyable contest nonetheless. Unlucky Wolfson, simply outbuzzed tonight, but a fine series of performances still, thanks very much indeed for playing. Well done Durham though, another strong performance against proven good opponents, and very best of luck in the semi-finals!
The stats: Mr Raffle was comfortably the best buzzer of the night with six starters, while Ms Jones was, once again, best for Wolfson with two, ending her team's run with a final total of 29. On the bonuses, Wolfson converted 4 out of 9 (with the night's one penalty), while Durham managed 17 out of 36.
Next week's match: Trinity vs Jesus
Only Connect had its penultimate match tonight, the third place play-off between the Forrests and the Turophiles; a full review of the match will follow in the coming days (I'll be doing one for next week's final too).
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