Celebrate Our Champions: 2024–2025 Robotics Season Highlights

CFI Head Coach
May 21, 2025
From local qualifiers to state championships, CFI teams pushed boundaries, solved tough challenges, and came home with top honors.
The 2024–2025 season has been one of the most thrilling and successful years yet for the Center for Future Innovators. Our robotics teams across multiple leagues rose to the occasion, showing off not only their engineering skills but also their teamwork, perseverance, and creativity. From rookie breakthroughs to seasoned veterans leveling up their game, this season was packed with wins, growth, and unforgettable moments.
Here’s a look at the highlights from this year’s robotics competitions:
VEX V5 Competitions
Southworks Engineering and Robotics Olympics🥉 3rd Place Overall – Team BYTE Robotics
High Stakes Illinois VEX V5 Qualifiers🛠 Robot Build Award – Team BYTE Robotics
BYTE Robotics impressed judges and fellow teams alike with their creative designs, structural precision, and smart game strategy. As one of our newer competitive teams, their strong showing at both events sets the stage for exciting seasons to come.
FIRST LEGO League (FLL)
Illinois State Qualifiers🧠 Robot Design Award – Team Aquanauts⚙️ Robot Performance Award – Team Aquanauts⚙️ Robot Performance Award – Team Deep Innovators🏅 Champions Award – Team Deep Innovators
Illinois State Sectionals🧠 Robot Design Award Finalist – Team Deep Innovators⚙️ 2nd Place Robot Performance – Team Deep Innovators
Illinois State Championship⚙️ 7th Place Robot Performance Rank – Team Aquanauts
Both Aquanauts and Deep Innovators demonstrated outstanding programming and strategy throughout the FLL season. Deep Innovators especially stood out, taking home multiple awards and representing CFI at the highest level of state competition.
Illinois 4-H Robotics Challenge – AIBOT
Rookie Challenge🏆 State Champions – Team BOB (Brain over Brawn)🏅 Top Table Score Award – Team BOB
Level 2 Challenge🏆 State Champions – Team ChatGPTeam🏅 Top Table Score Award – Team ChatGPTeam
AIBOT Grand Challenge👑 Grand Champions – Team ChatGPTeam
Our 4-H teams showed tremendous creativity in problem-solving and innovation. From first-time competitors like BOB to returning champions like ChatGPTeam, their work reflected both technical growth and collaboration.
URC Robo Sumo – Illinois State Competition
🥇 1st Place – Jayden
🥈 2nd Place – Isaias
🥉 3rd Place – Vincent
The URC Robo Sumo competition was intense, but our students held their ground with impressive engineering and control. With students as young as 10 years old competing, these victories show that determination and grit go a long way.
Why This Matters
These achievements reflect more than just technical skill. Each project involved hours of teamwork, trial and error, and problem-solving. They represent confidence built in the lab, leadership developed on teams, and a commitment to pushing past what’s easy to reach for what’s possible
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A Message from Our Coaches
To every student who joined a team this season: we are so proud of you. Whether you were coding sensors late at night, rebuilding arms between rounds, or stepping up to explain your ideas to a panel of judges, you’ve shown what it means to be a future innovator.
Get Involved
Interested in joining a robotics team next season? Whether you're a beginner or a returning builder, there’s a place for you at CFI.