Tournament Champions! From left: senior Connor Parson, senior Mica Houghton, and junior Joseph Levesque of the LA Robotics team.  The Lincoln Academy Robotics Team Competing at the Leavitt High School Robotics Meet on December 9.

The Lincoln Academy Robotics team is off to a strong early start to the 2023-24 competitive season. After a very successful trip to Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) on November 30 and December 1, where they won six out of ten matches in a national tournament, the team took their robot, 8030A, to a regional tournament at Leavitt Area High School on December 16.

“Although it’s a bit crazy to compete on consecutive weekends, the team wanted to take what they learned at WPI and apply it to a Maine competition, so we went to Leavitt,” said LA robotics coach and math teacher Sue Levesque, “and they had spectacular results.”

At the end of the qualification round, LA was the top-seeded team with a record of five wins and one loss. “In the elimination round, they formed an alliance with a team from Cape Elizabeth, whose robot had complementary skills to their robot, and the two teams together were unstoppable,” continued Levesque. “The LA and Cape Elizabeth alliance sailed through the elimination round and won the championship.”

In addition, team members Connor Parson, Mica Houghton, and Joseph Levesque received the Good Sportsmanship Award for the meet. The judges said they were helpful and friendly to everyone.

Winning the Leavitt tournament qualifies team 8030A for the Maine State Robotics Tournament, which is held in February. This is the earliest in the season that an LA team has ever qualified for states.

“Connor, Mica, and Joseph worked through the summer on their robot, and all that early work is paying off,” said Levesque. “This is the first time the LA Robotics program has had a robot ready to compete this early in the season. We’re usually not ready for tournaments until mid-January. Their success is a result of hard work and dedication over the last six months.”

“Going to the WPI meet helped us figure out so many strategies,” said senior team member Connor Parson. “We figured out how to make the robot competitive.” Parson also pointed out that before winning the Leavitt meet, LA had never won a regional tournament, even in 2022, the only year an LA team has ever made it to the World Championships. Until this year the highest an LA team has ever placed was second.

“Going in we were not expecting to win the Leavitt Meet,” said Parson, “but coming out of that meet, we have established ourselves as one of the most competitive teams in the state.”