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Published Sunday, February 05, 2012 in Education

Special

Members of the GYSTC Explorers robotics team include front, left to right, Nick Burkey, Al Robertson, Jack Carroll, Sam Moran, Ian Henshaw, Luke Morgan, Braden Ray and Beck Glover; back, Ben Sandstrom, Coach Craig Exner, Zane Exner and Benne Wagner.

GYSTC Explorers finish with highest score of their season

By Rebecca Leftwich

The Newnan Times-Herald

With its highest score of the season, the GYSTC Explorers robotics team finished 11th overall at the state First Lego League tournament last weekend on the Georgia Tech campus.

And Coach Craig Exner is already looking to sophomore season.

"We feel pretty good about next year," Exner said. "We feel like we'll probably keep most of our core group with us. We're a pretty tight group."

Only two of the 48 teams competing in the state "Food Factor" event will travel to the national tournament in St. Louis this April, but simply qualifying for state was a big accomplishment for the largely elementary-aged Explorers. When competition began last fall, 411 teams across Georgia were competing.

"The event goes up to age 14, so there were a lot of middle school teams ahead of us," Exner said. "We are definitely a young team, and we got started late in the season because we signed up at the last minute."

Exner said his team has posted better times during near-daily practices leading up to the state event, but actual competition can be overwhelming and he is pleased that his team ended its season on a high note.

"There are always nerves at the table," Exner said. "Everything that can go wrong usually does, but we're getting better about that. If we had scored what we score in our (practice), we would have been 20 or 25 points higher. But we feel pretty good about having our highest score of the season."

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