2024 Season Recap
Today, Morpheus is proud to present our 2024 season recap video! The video is available on our Media page and on YouTube.
FIRST Robotics Competition (FRC) is an international competition where high school students must build a robot to compete in a new game each year. Through their time in FRC, students learn important engineering principles related to physics, mechanical design, manufacturing, electrical systems, programming, statistical analysis, presentation skills, and much more.
Morpheus is the name of an independent neighborhood FRC team based in Concord, New Hampshire, not affiliated with a high school. The team has been active since 2015, and operates on the motto “Dream Big.” Despite having a small number of students, they always aim for the top no matter what. Students on the team come from all over New Hampshire, and are encouraged to pursue excellence in every activity. This year, their hard work paid off in a big way.
Each year on the first Saturday of January, FIRST, an organization based in Manchester, New Hampshire, livestreams a kick-off event to reveal the new FRC game to teams around the world. Teams then have 6 weeks to fully design, build, wire, and program their robots before competitions start. At competitions, matches are 3 vs 3, so each team must work with two other teams to get points and win against the other “alliance” of three robots. Robots get points by performing various tasks within the game, including both autonomous and student-controlled actions. For each district or region in the world, teams participate in competitions against other teams in their area, and if they rise to the top, they advance to the FRC World Championship, which hosts 600 of the best teams in the world, out of over 3000 existing teams.
From the first day of the 2024 season, Morpheus students and mentors worked hard to come up with robot designs that would be competitive in this year’s game. They started with prototyping and computer-aided 3D modeling, and over the course of 6 weeks, the robot came to life. Soon, the time came for the New England district competitions, but Morpheus was ready, along with their robot, “Squall,” named after the night when a snow squall took out the power in the workshop, and students had to continue working by flashlight. In their two district events, Morpheus ranked 3rd and 2nd respectively, with an overall win-loss-tie record of 20-9-1. Additionally, the students earned the Judges’ Award for being one of the judges’ favorite teams, and the Autonomous Award, for demonstrating high-performance autonomous robot actions.
The team’s performance earned them a spot at the New England District Championship (NEDCMP) in Springfield, MA, along with the other top teams in New England. After a grueling day of qualification matches, Morpheus ended up ranked 11 out of 48. Despite not being in the top 8, their performance did not go unnoticed, and they became the first pick of Alliance 5. Together with their alliance, Morpheus climbed through the double elimination bracket, and finished the competition ranked 3rd in their division! Overall in New England, Morpheus was ranked 20 out of 182 teams, with the top 30 teams qualifying for the World Championship.
The team had less than a week to make necessary fixes and upgrades to the robot before it had to be shipped out to Houston, TX. A week after that, the team members made the journey to Houston themselves to pick up their robot in the massive George R. Brown Convention Center, the venue for the FRC World Championship. From the very first moment, the students and mentors were hard at work, setting up the pit, checking the robot for damage, calibrating the robot, and gathering information on the other 73 teams in their division. Over the course of the next two days, Morpheus ended up ranked high enough to be the 8th alliance captain! After a long night of careful analysis, the team came in the next morning, ready to choose their alliance partners. The choices? First, Texas Torque, a team from Texas who was ranked surprisingly low for their performance, and was sure to be overlooked by the other alliance captains. Second, Huskies, a team from Illinois whose game design challenge submission from 3 years ago was the inspiration for part of the 2024 game. And Third, as a backup robot, Pantherbots, a team also from Texas who was known and trusted by Texas Torque to be reliable in a pinch. With the alliances set, it was time for the double elimination bracket. As the lowest seeded alliance, Morpheus and partners were the underdogs, with their first match being against the 1st seeded alliance, a definite powerhouse of the division. The first match ended as a loss for Morpheus, but just barely. Since their first match was a loss, it meant that any further loss would be the end of their journey. But the students were not shaken. With a rousing motivational speech from the coach of Texas Torque, everyone found a fire in their spirits. One win after another, the alliance worked like a well oiled machine, and eventually, they had to face the 1st alliance again; a chance at redemption. It was a close match once again, but this time, the 8th alliance came out on top, by a mere 3 points! In a satisfying sweep, the 8th alliance won all their remaining matches, securing their spot as the Johnson Division champions! In addition to their victory, Morpheus also received the Innovation in Control Award, for their innovative integration of sensors to control the robot.
After winning the division, Morpheus and their partners went on to compete in the Einstein super division, a double elimination bracket featuring the winning alliance of each of the 8 World Championship divisions. Unfortunately, Morpheus’ alliance lost two matches in a row. However, the first loss was against the eventual world champions, and the second match was lost by only one point. The alliance's performance showed without a doubt that their spot on the Einstein field was well deserved. Overall, Morpheus ended the season as the captain of the alliance that placed 7th in the world this year, and next year, they will be aiming for the very top!
Of course, the team would not have been able to make it so far without the support of various donors, mostly family, friends, and local companies. Morpheus would like to extend their heartfelt gratitude to all of the team’s generous sponsors this year!