Speech and debate begins with on-line platform

The Bobcat high school speech and debate team took part in their first tournament of the season on Saturday, a novice meet presented by Jackson and Cheyenne East.

With 11 teams across the state participating, the Cats brought home their first 1A-2A Sweeps Championship in the online-only platform.

Individual winners for the day included Acacia Harris who placed fourth overall in poetry, Julia Quintanilla with a fourth overall in extemp and Elizabeth Keller who placed sixth overall in extemp.

"This season is wildly different from any other season we've had," said coach Cindy Glasson. "We are doing all tournaments online, so there isn't an audience for the kids to play off of. This makes if a completely new kind of platform.

"Saturday's tournament is the earliest the team has ever competed, too. We will occasionally have a December tournament, but we don't really start our competition until the first week in January, so for these novice kids to take sweeps this early is an amazing accomplishment."

Having to attend tournaments online began at the end of last season when the pandemic hit just as students were heading to the State Tournament. Since then, coaches across the state have been learning how the process works as well as figuring out the platform being used for tabulation of entries and final results.

Coach Lyle Wylie has taken the lead on behalf of the Cats to learn the new programs and ensure the students are set up correctly. Doing very early tournaments like the one on Saturday is a learning curve for both the students and the coaches.

For most of the events doing things online isn't much of an issue, but for some, such as humor, there is no audience to gauge if you're getting laughs in the right places. Duet is another event that is going to be more difficult this year as the competitors cannot even be in the same room with each other when they're performing.

For the new competitors it's a little easier to do things the "new way" since they haven't experienced things the "old way."

"That's what's hardest for our varsity members," Glasson said. "They're used to the camaraderie of in-person competition, the friends they make when we travel, that sort of thing.

"Coach Wiley and I have a few things up our sleeves, though that should help with team building and creating our own team building experience. The plus side to all of this, I think, is that these new members are getting their feet wet in a safe environment online and in the end, I think that is going to make them even stronger competitors when we get back to in-person tournaments."

The Cats will compete again on December 4 and 5 for the virtual Cheyenne South tournament.