Courtesy of Superior Roboworks Superior Roboworks 857 of Houghton poses with robot Francois XXIV and their winning blue banner at the 2024 FIRST Robotics Competition in Escanaba on Sunday.

ESCANABA — Thirty-eight FIRST Robotics teams from across the Upper Peninsula and the northern Lower Peninsula converged in Escanaba last weekend. After nine weeks of planning, drafting, building and programming, the teams came prepared to compete in this year’s game: Crescendo.

The district event’s game challenged competitors to cooperatively shoot foam rings into a “speaker” and “amp” and hang on a chain at the end. Qualifying matches happened on Friday and Saturday to determine each team’s rank for alliance selection, where teams create partnerships to compete in the playoff matches.

Between matches, teams and spectators were dancing, cheering and scouting for potential alliance partners. Escanaba High School was full of energy as the matches ensued.

Early in the competition, Superior Roboworks 857 of Houghton looked like a promising frontrunner, with its bot Francois XXIV. They started strong and kept up the pressure through their 12 qualifying matches.

The matches begin with 15 seconds of autonomous play, meaning the robots are pre-programmed. With their competent programming, 857 consistently scored maximum points. Then driver Rachel B took the controls, assisted by operator Collin D and human players Mason H and Kyle H, with Jacob M being the team’s technician and Chris Doig coaching the drive team. Gameplay got fast and fierce, and 857 met every challenge.

Spirits soared as the team won match after match and emerged as rank No. 3. When it came time for alliance selection, Superior Roboworks was the first pick of the No. 1-ranked team, 4391 BraveBots of Gladstone.

The alliance of 857 and 4391, joined by 6113 M.A.R.C. 1 from Menominee, won every one of their matches in the playoffs and finals, winning the whole event and taking home a blue banner.

Team 857 is sponsored by many generous businesses, including General Motors, Great Lakes Sound and Vibration, ThermoAnalytics, Orbion Space Technology, GS Engineering, the Michigan Department of Education, Xeratec and David Kent Consulting.

Superior Roboworks will be competing this coming weekend at Lake Superior State University and will be at the Superior Maker Fest on March 23 at Houghton High School to demonstrate their robots. With the points they’ve earned so far, they will qualify for the state competition in April.

Other local teams competed in Escanaba, including Calumet Copper Bots, Chassell Copper Country Cats, Ewen Pantherbots2, Lake Linden Robotic Turmoil, L’Anse Aluminum Sting and Ontonagon Gladiators.