U Students Win Prestigious Programming Contest
November 8, 2019
The team, “Utah Hydrogen,” beat 71 other teams in the U.S. and Canada to win the Rocky Mountain Regional of the Intercollegiate Programming Contest.
The team comprised of SoC undergraduates Igor Durovic, Oliver Flatt, and Sam Zachary came from behind in the last hour to edge out five strong teams from the Universities of Alberta, Calgary, and Lethbridge to win the regional. The School of Computing team solved 9 of the 11 problems during the five-hour competition; five teams solved 8, two teams solved 7, and three teams solved 6.
By winning the regional, Igor, Oliver, and Sam have qualified for both the ICPC North American Championship (in Atlanta in February) and the ICPC World Finals (in Moscow in June).
Five other teams from the University of Utah competed solving between two and five problems each.
The Rocky Mountain Regional of the Intercollegiate Programming Contest took place October 26th at sites in Utah, Arizona, Colorado, Montana, and Alberta.
The International Collegiate Programming Contest (ICPC) is an algorithmic programming contest for college students. Teams of three, representing their university, work to solve the most real-world problems, fostering collaboration, creativity, innovation, and the ability to perform under pressure. Through training and competition, teams challenge each other to raise the bar on the possible. Quite simply, it is the oldest, largest, and most prestigious programming contest in the world.
PHOTO: Sam Zachary and Oliver Flatt (not pictured: Igor Durovic)