The Highland Park Math Team had its first meet of the 2014-2015 season Monday at Central High School. While the team has been very successful for a long time – going to the state tournament every year for the past 19 – Monday’s meet brought another triumph as Highland defeated Central and the rest of the St. Paul City Division for the first time in six years, with a final score of 83-74. Juniors David (“D-Wheezy”) White and Katie Watson led the team to victory with 13 and 12 points respectively.

The math season runs from mid-October to mid-February, and it is composed of five meets plus a state tournament in March. Highland competes with the seven high schools in the athletic conference, plus Cretin-Derham Hall and Saint Paul Preparatory School. The meets have four individual events, lettered A, B, C and D, and a team event at the end. Each of the individual events is centered around a specific topic – Event A is mostly algebra, while Event B focuses on topics from geometry – and is worth 7 points. Events are much like short math quizzes, with students only having 12 minutes to complete them.

Eight students are pre-selected as “starters” before each meet, and their scores count towards the school’s score. They also participate in the team event at the end of the meet, a 20-minute, 6-question, 24-point event that they work on together. Highland scored a perfect 24 on the T event this meet.

The math team is well on its way to participating in the state tournament for 20 consecutive years. The team’s next meet is November 24th.

Team Twitter: @hp_mathteam

Team Coaches: Michael O’Connell & Christopher Anderson

Team Captains: Tate Bosler (senior, @ichiefboz) & Katie Watson (junior, @coffeemoose)