SYRACUSE — Wawasee Iron Pride Robotics team will be competing in the state tournament Saturday, March 10, at Lucas Oil Stadium in Indianapolis. The team will be defending its state title from the 2016-17 school year.

Iron Pride has qualified all 10 of its teams for the tournament, including nine in the high school division and one in the middle school division. This year Wawasee Robotics earned the following honors: 12 tournament champions, four excellence awards, five design awards, six robot skills awards and one judges award.

Team 574C Centurion is currently ranked number one in the world on the world skills standing leader board.

Thirty-two Wawasee students are members of Iron Pride. Teams have been designing, building and programming their robots since June 2017. They have competed in 10 regular season tournaments this school year.

“We are thrilled every team is going to state this year,” said Jed Wandland, head robotics coach. “We have more teams qualified for state this season than we did last year. Having a number one world ranked team is incredible. While, as a team, we are focused on the state competition and qualifying for worlds in Louisville, Kentucky, we will have to do significant fundraising for the trip to worlds. There has been a change in qualifying for worlds and we have a shot at qualifying multiple teams for worlds.”