Trivia Perfection at Brown’s Brewing

I’ve played trivia at Brown’s Brewing in Troy for two years.  I played at Brown’s when the trivia competition was a 60-question game on Wednesday nights, when Ryan West was the host.  I played there when Zach Hilton took over for Ryan, and it was at that time that my trivia teammates, Jeremy McNamara and Alexis Curry, joined my little one-man trivia operation.

Since then, the Street Academy trivia team has, in the span of this one calendar year, won Trivia Bowl 6, won the Summer Bowl (the “Silver Shaker award”), and claimed $1,500 in the summer Elbo Room trivia tournament.

But last night, we accomplished something that only two trivia teams in the history of Capital District bar and tavern trivia have ever accomplished.  And it involved some very close calls.

Background.

Last Thursday, my Street Academy team (Jeremy, Alexis, Erin and myself) claimed a first place win at the Elbo Room tournament, which secured us a berth in the finals in February.  After that game, I decided to go visit Trivia Nights Live organizer Kevin Baker, who was hosting an evening trivia matchup at Junior’s on Madison Avenue.  Upon arriving at Junior’s, I saw what appeared to be one of my team trivia opponents, sitting at the bar and playing on another team.

It was Lindsay – she plays on the Blue Mooned team.

I stopped over and asked her how things were going.  She told me that she wasn’t playing on the Blue Mooned team any more, that she had gone through a falling-out with her teammates.  I said that if she wanted to come over to Brown’s this Monday, she could play on the Street Academy team for the night – a one-night only invitation, but enough to let the Blue Mooned team know that they were missing out on a decent teammate.

She agreed.

This is nothing new for the Street Academy team.  I’ve had several teammates who have joined for a week or two after having disagreements with their original team – Rich Mahady joined Street Academy after winning two Trivia Bowls with Lynch’s Mob; and Jennie and Mark were members of Boats and Hoes before they left that team and played with Street Academy for about two months.  And I’ve even played from time to time with Dan Smith of Tres Hombres as a combined “Hombres Academy,” just for a night out for fun.

So last night, I got my usual “champion’s table” (table 21 at Brown’s), and ordered Brown’s tasty chicken spiedies.  A few minutes later, Lindsay showed up.  The members of the Blue Mooned team also arrived shortly after that, and they stared at Lindsay as if she was Derek Jeter in a Washington Nationals uniform.

And as Jeremy and Alexis arrived for the game, trivia host Stephen Murray read the first of twenty questions.

“In the film of the same name, what type of bird is ‘Paulie?’”

“It’s a parrot,” Alexis replied.

First answer right.

By the quarter-mark, we had gone five for five, correctly answering the identity of the actor who was Uma Thurman’s boyfriend in “My Super Ex-Girlfriend” (Luke Wilson), the college Meadow Soprano attended (Columbia), and what magazine did an interview with General Stanley McChrystal that caused McChrystal’s resignation (Rolling Stone).  Not bad.  We’ve hit five-for-five before  -it’s a good feeling, but it just means we’ve had a decent start.

Of course, this was not lost on Blue Mooned – they decided for the night to rebrand their team name as “Street Drug Academy.”  Oh, the hilarity.  That, and the fact that Blue Mooned was about 12 points behind us at the time.

But as the second half progressed, we kept hitting the answers.  We knew how many territories were in Canada (3).  We knew the Hilary Swank film that shared its name with a Cure song (Boys Don’t Cry).  By halftime, we had 68 points and a firm lock on first place.

And Blue Mooned renamed their team from “Street Drug Academy” to “Big Sexy.”  Don’t know why they keep naming their team after me, but I’ll take the compliments…

By the end of the third quarter, Street Academy was still on top, with no signs of slowing down.  We hit the quadruple bonus question, correctly identifying the H’s in the 4-H credo (head, heart, health, hands – not horticulture), as well as the home town of Clubber Lang in Rocky III (Chicago) and the composer of “Requiem in D Minor” (Mozart).

As Jeremy handed up one of the slips, another team congratulated him on his squad’s potential perfect game.  Jeremy shrugged it off, not wanting to suffer any jinxes.

We had seventeen questions correctly answered – no skips or double-chances used.  Then came the triple bonus question.  “Name the three players – one from the Red Sox, one from the White Sox, and one from the Tigers – who pitched no-hitters in 2007.”

I had to try to remember them.  Think think think think, I’m tapping my head like I’m Winnie the Pooh.  I knew Clay Bucholz was one of the no-hitter pitchers, because I recall him achieving the no-no as a mid-season callup with Boston.  I tried to remember the Detroit pitcher – he was on the team when the Tigers lost 100 games and it wasn’t the guy who lost 20 games that year – it was Mark Maroth, but that wasn’t the guy who threw a no-hitter – I think it was Justin something, Justin Verlander I think – and then I had to remember if Mark Buerhle pitched his no-hitter in 2007, because I thought he pitched it in 2008.  Those were the names I wrote down.  The slip went up to the host.

The answer was Buehrle, Verlander and Bucholz.  Three for three, and a perfect game on the horizon!!

The final question was at the ready.  Street Academy had – get this – 166 points, perfect through 19 questions.  No skips were used.  The double-chance option was left alone.  We were one answer away from a remarkable achievement in competitive team trivia.

The final category was “Populations.”

“We should bet it all,” said Jeremy.  “We’re never going to get a chance like this ever again.”

I thought about this.  If we won tonight, whether it’s by one point or by a hundred, we would win the $30 gift card from Brown’s.  If this was during Trivia Bowl or one of the money tournaments, an “all-in” bet would wipe us out if we got the answer wrong.  Bet smart versus bet strong.

As I slowly drew the number 166 on the bet slip, I remembered that I was at this point in competitive team trivia before – four years ago, to be precise, when I had answered 19 in a row and screwed up on the final question.

No matter.  We’re playing for a gift card, and we’re playing for glory.  Everything in.  Up went the bet slip.

“Among the five most populated countries, where is the United States ranked?”

The four of us huddled around the table.  We knew that China and India were the two most populated countries, but after that – we tried to think of another country that might have a half a billion people , we thought of Brazil, we thought of Russia, we thought of Indonesia – and we couldn’t come up with one that had more people than the United States.  Everybody else had already handed in their slips.

We wrote down “3” and I walked the slip to the host.

Murray read the answer.

“China is 1, India is 2 … Brazil is 5, and between the United States and Indonesia…”

Fingers are crossed.  I started having flashbacks of the time before, when I missed on the 19th question.  If we got this wrong, we would get clowned unmercifully.

“Indonesia is number … 4.”

Which means the United States is 3rd – and it means that Street Academy, augmented with guest member Lindsay from Blue Mooned – has just hit only the third perfect trivia game in Capital District team trivia history, joining Stern Fans (Arc Sports Bar and Grille) and Lynch’s Mob (Recovery Sports Bar – Troy) as achieving trivia perfection!  Oh man oh man – Trivia Bowl champions, Summer Bowl champions, Elbo Room champions – and now a perfect game!  It can’t get any better than this!!

And we even got some love on the Trivia Nights Live.com website!!!

And Lindsay now has one thing over her former trivia teammates – she can claim to have participated in a perfect game with a winning trivia team!

So let this be a lesson to all trivia teams out there – make sure you keep your teammates happy, or they might end up spending a week winning with the Street Academy!!