On March 7, 2026, Lexington High School’s National Ocean Sciences Bowl (NOSB) A team and B team placed first and second, respectively, at MIT’s Blue Lobster Bowl, a regional event where nine teams from throughout Massachusetts and Maine competed against each other.
NOSB is an organization that hosts competitions that test contestants’ knowledge of various ocean related fields, such as ocean biology, geology, and technology. Each competition consists of a written Team Challenge Question (TCQ) section and two six-minute buzzer rounds.
Preparing for the competition was an extensive process that required members to dedicate significant time and effort into independent research and group practices.
“It would be [about] two and a half hours every week since October, November, as well as about 30 to 45 minutes a day in the last month,” Pranav Jannabhatla, a sophomore and member of the A team, said.
Mrigank Verma, a sophomore and the captain of the A team, reflected on the challenges the team faced in studying for and competing in the Blue Lobster Bowl.
“The hardest part of preparing is knowing what you’re going to prepare. There’s some conceptual concepts, but then some of it you just have to memorize, and that’s pretty bad. The hardest part of competing is probably just keeping your nerves down and being focused and able to have that memory recall,” Verma said.
Nerves, a major part of any competition, had plagued the team last year in their first competition.
“Last year we had a really bad time with our nerves. Every single round, we were really tense and we weren’t able to shake it off, even during the two-minute break that we had, ” Jannabhatla said.
This year, the team has resorted to various techniques, physical and mental alike, to improve their performance.
“One of them was during break time […] I would have the team do jumping jacks to get all their jitters out and feel a little bit more lively. Later down, we started doing some box breathing, which also helped a lot,” Jannabhatla added.
Mutual support and encouragement among team members also contributed to the teams’ successes.
“[The culture] is really supportive. In practice, if you get something wrong or at competitions you get something wrong, we always try not to beat ourselves down, and we try to get up from that. [While competing], every time someone got a question right, we were doing high fives or fist bumps, and that was really encouraging,” Verma said.
Overall, preparing for and competing at the Blue Lobster Bowl served as a valuable experience for members of both teams.
“I think almost the entire B team were new people. They’re all freshmen, they’re all very new to NOSB, and this is their first competition.” Jannabhatla said. “All of them were consistently showing up, which was definitely making a testament on how well they were learning.”
Looking forward to their future competitions, Verma shared his plan for the A team.
“We’re going to keep doing what we’ve been doing, and we’re going to try to be consistent with our study schedule and not try to get too caught up,” Verma said.
