Clinton High Academic Team Wins State; Clinton Middle School Earns Second Place

Friday morning, March 25, 2022 the Clinton High and Clinton Middle School Academic Teams headed to Kershaw County for the Eighth South Carolina Academic Team State Championship.

The contest pits the winners of the four sponsoring and participating educational consortia (the Olde English, the Pee Dee, the Midlands, and the Western Piedmont). Clinton High School and Clinton Middle School are part of the Western Piedmont group, more commonly known as WPEC (Western Piedmont Educational Consortium).

This particular consortium has the following districts as members: Abbeville County, Anderson 3 (Crescent), Edgefield County, Greenwood 50 (Greenwood), Greenwood 51 (Ware Shoals), Greenwood 52 (Ninety Six), Laurens 55, Laurens 56, Lexington 3 (Batesburg-Leesville), McCormick County, Newberry County, Saluda County, and Union County.

Both CHS and CMS won their respective championships during the WPEC competition–in December for the high school and early March for the middle school.

Months upon months of preparation, practice, scrimmages, and computer competitions honed the skills, reflexes, and copious amounts of information able to be recalled in a split second. Much like team jeopardy, Academic Bowl is based on the College Bowl of the 1960s and 1970s. Knowledge, reasoning, anticipation, and speed all come together for the very best academic teams.

Since the State Championship is based on enrollment, Clinton High School, although a AAA team, competed and won the Large School Division against Greenwood, Laurens, and Emerald High Schools in the fall. Clinton Middle School also won their WPEC championship against Mid Carolina, Westview, and Brewer.

Having earned their right to play in the state championship, the teams left Friday morning with the hopes of bringing recognition back to their district and their consortium.

Central Carolina Technical College and the Woolard Technology Center hosted the event. Think of the National Championship Football Playoff for a good comparison of how the contest works. Each consortium has their champions for the Large and Small School Divisions play against a paired opponent from another consortium.

Clinton High School played Rock Hill High School (from the Olde English Consortium) in the semifinals and defeated Rock Hill by a score of 43 – 23.

Clinton Middle School played Williams Middle School (from the Pee Dee Consortium) in the semifinals and defeated Williams by a score of 39 – 28.

Clinton Middle played for the state championship against Indian Land Middle School (from the Olde English Consortium) and lost on the last question, 35 – 36. The CMS students gave an incredible effort and played extremely well. The CMS team finished 2nd in the state.

The last match of the day featured Clinton High School taking on Spring Valley High School (from the Midlands Consortium). After a tied first quarter, 8 – 8, Clinton High surged into the lead at the end of the second quarter, 20 – 15. The third quarter tightened a bit with the score at the end of that quarter, CHS 28 and SVHS 25. Clinton High School surged a little in the fourth quarter to win a tightly contested match, 39 – 33.

Clinton High earned its second consecutive South Carolina Academic Team Championship. Clinton High also won in 2020 against Nation Ford High School.

Terri O’Shields is the head coach of both teams; Mr. Hugh Pace is the teams’ statistician and best bus driver ever. Mr. Jeff Parks, principal at CMS, attended and offered his support for the middle school team. A sizable number of parents and family members were also in attendance for the middle school competition.

Mr. Patrick Nelson and Ms. Asheton Wilbanks, both former teammates and members of the 2020 championship team, attended and supported both teams in their championship quest.

Both Clinton Academic teams represented the district and their respective schools extremely well. For a small town, Clinton continues to punch above its weight and prove the old adage correct, “Dynamite comes in small packages.”

Great job, Wildcats and Red Devils.

Click on the images to get a look at the winning teams!