An aquarium flooded, fish are flying everywhere, and you’re in a treehouse. What do you do?

This is a typical challenge topic for improvisation (improv) teams headed to Destination Imagination (DI) Global Finals May 25 through May 28, and two Pacelli Catholic High School teams are no exception.

They get the topic, three minutes to brainstorm, four minutes to do the skit inside a confined area, and oh, surprise, there is a mysterious stranger who has to be incorporated just as the skit begins.

“It’s interesting, the different knowledge base they’ve acquired over the year and what they each bring to the table,” said Anne Rogalski, coach of the Alpha Omega DI team. “The energy of this team as they step onto the stage, you can just feel it … I celebrate every year.”

Alpha Omega and Pacelli’s other improv team Omikron head to the Global competition in Knoxville, Tenn., next week. It is not the teams’ first time striving to be on top of the world – in the past three years, Pacelli Catholic Schools have sent at least two teams each year. Last year, Pacelli High School’s The Crew took second at Globals while Omikron (a then-freshmen team) took 10th, and Alpha tied for 14th place.

In 2014, The Crew placed 28th but Omikron, which was a middle school competitor at Globals that year, took the top slot, beating out teams from Texas (second, fifth and ninth), China (third), Illinois (fourth-tie, sixth and eighth) and South Korea (seventh).

In 2013, two Pacelli High School teams competed, one taking first and one tying for ninth.

“With the team going to Globals for their third year in a row, I know that they’re very excited,” said Claire Baumhofer, who coaches Omikron along with Syd Otis. “By now, the team knows what to expect for the most part. I think that definitely helps us when practicing.

“To even make it to Globals is everything, and I think the kids go into it with a positive outlook,” she said. “They’re just looking to do their best, and Syd and I are so proud of them for making it as far as they have.”

Global Finals this year include more than 8,000 students making up more than 1,400 teams from 20 different countries across the globe and 48 of the 50 United States. The Pacelli teams are two of 53 teams from Wisconsin. Also competing at Globals from central Wisconsin are The Glitter Gang from Plover, and The B4’s and Super Six Sole Savers from Amherst.

Destination Imagination is an organization for ages kindergarten through university level that promotes creativity and problem-solving through STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics), the arts and service learning challenges. Some challenges require building, some research and presentation, others community-related projects and still others, as in the case of Pacelli’s teams, coming up with plausible solutions to perhaps ridiculous problems on the fly.

“When I first started, I struggled – I think we all did – with over analyzing and inhibiting ourselves,” Alpha Omega member Julia Neufeld said. “Now, I get such a rush off competing and I think we all do our best then, when we’re under pressure.”

Creative chaos likely is the best way to describe the team in action. They are given a topic and on “go” they all start talking, tossing out different ideas on how to flush out the idea and which characters each person can portray, what the scene is, and during all of this last week, team member Becca Formella created props to use out of newspaper.

Time is called. The team members have just seconds to gather themselves, the “mysterious stranger” (for Alpha Omega that’s Ben Bisone) is slipped a piece of paper with his last-minute character on it, and then they are on.

Sometimes, the conversation gets away from the characters as they begin exchanges between themselves. “So, back to this wedding,” Nick Rosenthal said at one point guiding the group back to the topic and the problem to solve. He dropped the hint to his teammates at a moment in the skit that it seemed to fit in, and it also brought laughter.

“We’re all completely nervous because it could go completely wrong or completely right,” he said. “When you walk out there and you’re ready, the stress all goes away and you really have fun with it.”

In the aquarium scenario with treehouse setting, the mysterious stranger who plunged into the scene at the outset was an Olympic bobsled repairman. Amazingly, members of the Alpha Omega team made it work.

“We’re having a lot more fun,” said Caleb Kulich. “That happens when things mesh together. It’s how you know you’re doing well, when you’re having fun. That’s my favorite part, when it all comes together.”

Sometimes, that isn’t as easy as it sounds, they say. Having worked – or played as the case may be – with each other for the past three years, team members admit to having squabbles on occasion.

“But we’re really tied to each other,” said Mariah Studinski. “If someone goes down, we’ll bring them back up … One thing I really like is the sense of community we have. I feel like we really know each other really well. You learn to trust each other. We really like each other, and it’s really fun.”

Omikron team consists of Laura Mitch, Daniel Mitch, Mackenzie Schlagenhaft, Tim Shulfer, Chris Jensen and Noah LaMaide. All are sophomores.

Alpha Omega team members are Caleb Kulich, Nick Rosenthal, Ben Bisone, Mariah Studinski, Becca Formella, Karisa Mansavage and Julia Neufeld. All are juniors except Ben Bisone, who is a senior.