Paly’s Robotics team had a rough start at their first regional competition of the year in San Jose.

The competition, known as FIRST, an acronym for "For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology," challenged students to build a robot to score points by making baskets. Robots are grouped into teams made up of three schools each, and have an offense and defense, much like basketball.

"The competition is made up of three parts: build, animation, and public relations," said senior, Polly Ziegler, a member of the robotics team. "The build part of the competition is the main part where we build our own robot to compete against other teams."

Overall, the team placed 23rd out of 40 schools and won one out of three quarterfinal rounds. They also won five out of ten qualifying matches.

Ziegler, along with fellow seniors Clark Willison and Cameron Tacklind, co-captains of the robotics team, are a part of what robotics team advisor, Doug Bertain, calls "a veteran team."

With a team that has so many experienced members, Bertain expects a lot from his students.

Commenting on the competition in San Jose, Bertain said, "I think it went as well as could be expected with [our] not being able to practice with the robot."

The team’s robot was not completely finished, so they were not able to compete in practice rounds.

"For us [the robotics team], we ended our week with 80% [of the robot] done," Willison said.

The team also encountered other problems throughout the competition that caused some setbacks.

"In the second quarter final match, a minor malfunction lost us the match," Willison said.

According to Bertain, the team could have done better.

"They procrastinated in the build. They were overconfident, standard high school kid stuff," Bertain said. "I have high expectations. We really need to do well. We shouldn’t have to spend that much time on it [the robot]. I expect to win."

But the team’s performance in San Jose has not dulled their spirits. Many are very confident that they will do well in the upcoming FIRST regional in Las Vegas.

"To prepare for Las Vegas we might change some small things on our robot once we get there since we’ve competed once already," Ziegler said. "Now we know what works and what doesn’t."

Overall, team members expressed that they plan to do better in the Las Vegas regional than in the San Jose one.

According to Willison and Tacklind, the regional in Las Vegas has the exact same competition as in San Jose, with a basketball-like challenge.

"We’ll definitely do better than [in] San Jose," Tacklind said. "[In] San Jose we weren’t ready and hadn’t tested the robot. Now we’ll be ready. I’m confident to get to the finals, to win the finals."

Bertain agreed, "[In] the second regional you [teams] do a lot better."

The team also holds pride in the fact that their robots are 100% student built. However other schools have help from their sponsors with things like the build and the animation.

"We’re up against robots built by Ford," Bertain said.

According to Bertain, in a previous competition the team lost the animation competition to a school sponsored by Disney.

In the end, the team came out of the competition with a disappointing placing, but confidence for the regional in Las Vegas. And, most importantly, team members had fun during the competition.

"I think the most exciting part about the competition is competing during each round, having all the robots driving around the field trying to score points and also trying to defend against other robots," Ziegler said.

Remembering a more specific point in the competition when Paly’s team beat Los Altos High School’s team, Willison said, "We were total underdogs and we shut them down. That was really fun."

With the right spirit and mindset, the robotics team is confident and prepared for the next FIRST regional in Las Vegas.

"The point of FIRST is to have a lot of fun," Willison said.