VW wins robotics qualifier; next up: state

DAVE MOSIER/independent editor

The Van Wert High School Robotics Team not only hosted its third Northern Ohio First Tech Challenge Robotics Competition on Saturday, but the local team also competed for the first time and won the event, which is a qualifier for Ohio’s state competition being held in February.

A total of 28 teams from four states — Ohio, Indiana, Michigan, and Pennsylvania — competed in the event, which was held in the Van Wert High School gymnasium.

Van Wert, which was ranked second in the world among qualifiers prior to Saturday, won the competition with a 9-1 record, including a “best of 3” finals match that saw the Cougar team down by 60 points with 30 seconds to go in the deciding match. However, the Van Wert was able to rally, scoring 100 points in the final seconds to win the match, and the competition.

“The team has room to improve and things to fix as we prepare for the state championship in two weeks in Cincinnati,” said Bob Spath, who with Zane McElroy coaches the VWHS robotics team.

The drive team for the Van Wert Robotics Team included Cade Chiles, Spencer Teman, and Carter Eikenberry.

A number of special awards were also given out during the competition. Those included the following:

Judge’s Award – Hercules Team from Mansfield; Promote Award – Next Nova team from Sylvania; Control Award – Aurora (Ohio) team; Motivate Award – Apollo team from Caledonia, Michigan; PTC Design Award – Raptor Robotics from Elkhart, Indiana; Rockwell Collins Innovate Award – To Be Determined Team from Aurora; Connect Award – Wapakoneta team; Think Award – Aztechs FTC from Dublin; and the Inspire Award – Terabytes of Murrysville, Pennsylvania.

Spath said the competition, which featured nearly 300 students, was a success, with many positive comments from the competing teams about the competition, Van Wert High School, and the local community.

“We would like to thank all of our sponsors and volunteers for making this team and the weekend competition a success for us and for our community,” Spath noted.

Event title sponsors were Central Insurance Companies, APT Manufacturing Solutions, Ohio Northern University, Alliance Automation, and General Electric.