Powell High Schools robotics team 3188, also known as the Squiggle Splat Bang, placed first place and qualified for Super Regionals during State Robotics in Casper.

Not only did team 3188 take first place at the competition, but team 6437 finished second overall.

“What happens basically is you get into a mini tournament at the end. So it is the top four teams and they pick teammates or other teams to participate with them and they compete in a semi finals-finals and 3188 ended up winning that,” Mr. Joel Hayano said. “ And they also won the inspire award which is the overall first place award… They advance to super regionals. And then our second place team finished third inspire… and our other team 6437 didn’t make one of those awards so they did not qualify for super regionals.”

In the final tournament, teams have the opportunity to compete not only against people who made the final round, but also teams who were chosen to compete. Three Powell teams had the opportunity to compete in the finals.

“We actually ended up with three teams competing in the final competition because one of our other teams got picked to participate in the competition,” Mr. Hayano said. “So we had three of the 12 teams competing from Powell.”

After Super Regionals, team 3188 was able to begin preparing for Nationals. Team 3188 consists of students senior Rhett Pimentel, senior Hattie Pimentel, freshman Olivia Lambingier, senior Josh Malone, senior Nathaniel Whitham,and senior James Sheets.

“Now, the next competition are the winners from each state, so all the teams are really good,” said Mr. Hayano said before Super Regionals. “Now it’s just a matter of practicing to be as fast as possible and hopefully try win an award and make it to worlds.”

This year, freshman Jenna Merritt traveled with team 3188 to the competition.

“When the teams go, they try to take another person, someone new to the club, with them so they can get experience what they are going into and not just going in blind.”

While competing, the team did do as well as they have in the past.

“The team didn’t do as well as they should have. They had a lot of really bad luck,” Merritt said. “They had issues with static or they had times where electrical components of their robots stopped working”

Because Merritt was able to travel with the team, she has learned how national competitions work and is more prepared for next year.

“I think it was a really good experience because I was able to go and not have the stress of completing and I was able to meet the teams from all over this side of the country. And I just think it was really great because I was able to do what I wouldn’t have been able to do if I was competing.”

Because of their placement in the last competition, PHS’ robotics team will not be competing in the Worlds Competition. Throughout this year, the teams have been scoring high placements and have won many awards. The team will continue to compete in the next school year.