Since the Minnesota FIRST Robotics Competition became a varsity sport endorsed by the Minnesota State High School League in 2012, “The Green Machine” has strived to attain a State Championship title. This year, our 10th consecutive appearance in the event, was our year. Through the team’s dedication and hard work, we were successful in winning the 2022 State Championship title with our alliance partners FRC 5172-Gators and FRC 4607-CIS.
It didn’t come easily. We had a difficult schedule to begin the competition, resulting in losses in the first five matches. However, as the competition progressed, we won 2 out of the 3 last matches in our qualification schedule. At the end of the qualification matches, we ranked 29 out of the 36 teams. Only the top four- ranked teams at State pick the additional teams they want to have in their alliance in the playoffs. While we didn’t finish as highly ranked as we wanted to, we remained confident that our drive team’s ability to play awesome defense would be recognized by the alliance captains. All in all, we were chosen by the third-seed alliance Captain, FRC Team 5172, “Gators” (Greenbush Middle River School) to be part of their alliance alongside FRC Team 4607, “C.I.S.” (Becker High School).
As an alliance, our game strategy consisted of having 1816 focused on heavy defense and climbing, while Gators and C.I.S. worked on shooting cargo (kickball-sized balls that look like large tennis balls) into the designated middle-of-the-field hoops. This proved effective as we won our first match in the semi-finals with a 12-point lead against our opponent. But troubles came to light as Gators’ robot was unable to work properly for our second match because of a motor issue. This made our alliance very split on how we should continue into the second semi-final match. Our alliance faced a choice. We could replace our alliance Captain Gators with a backup team, but this would cause the disqualification of Gators from the alliance. The other option was to compete with only 2 robots against the other 3, buying much needed time for the Gators to make repairs and not be dismissed from the playoffs. We decided on the latter option, because our alliance could afford the loss of the second match and force a third-match to decide the round. This decision worked in our favor as 1816 and CIS pulled out a win with 5-points to spare. By having CIS and “The Green Machine” play the match, 2 robots against 3, it bought enough additional time for the Gators to complete repairs on their robot, and we were back to full strength.
In the final matches, our alliance beat the 1st seed alliance, led by FRC 3630-Stampede (Breck School), with a 2-0 win! Shout-outs and many thanks to FRC 5172, our alliance Captain, and 4607-CIS, partners all in fantastic teamwork and collaboration. It took all of us on the team, working together and within our subteams, to pull together this season. We are very proud to be featured in the MSHSL Post-event program hosted online by the MSHSL! Photos from the event were taken by three photographers, each with their own vision of the event: Emily Wicklund, who is also the event photographer for the Great Northern Regional, Grand Forks, ND, and Trent Roemen and Urva J. of Team 1816. We also send extra special thanks to sponsors of “The Green Machine” and our team mentors, for making our team’s success possible.
– by Jimmy V.