Debaters Dominate in Winning Fifth NW CEDA Title in Six Years
WALLA WALLA, Wash. -- The Whitman College debate program's fifth victory in six years at the Northwest Cross Examination Debate Association (CEDA) Championships was by far its most dominating.
Not only did the senior tandem of Thad Blank and Charles Olney win their third consecutive NW CEDA title, their opponent in the championship finals was Whitman's No. 2 team, senior David Guidry and sophomore Beth Schueler. This year's tournament was held Friday through Sunday on the Whitman campus.
After breezing through the tournament's preliminary and quarterfinal rounds by winning nine of nine ballots, Blank and Olney knocked off Emporia State University in the semifinals. Guidry and Schueler won eight of nine ballots en route to the semifinals, where they downed a team from Southern Illinois State University.
Whitman also swept the top three spots in the Individual Speaker competition. Blank collected the most speaker points to win the coveted Becky Galentine Award, which is named for a Whitman assistant debate coach who died of breast cancer in 1999. Olney, who placed second, had won the award at each of the two previous NW CEDA championships. Schueler finished third while Guidry placed eighth.
First-year student Eric Suni placed 10th in the tournament's final standings for individual speaker points. Suni and his debate partner, first-year student Nav Rekhi, came within a half-point of giving Whitman a third duo in Sunday's elimination rounds.
Blank and Olney will conclude their collegiate debate careers at the CEDA National Championships later this month (March 20-24) at Arizona State University, and at the National Debate Tournament early next month (April 4-7) at Emory University in Atlanta, Ga.
By winning last weekend's NW CEDA tournament, Blank and Olney completed a dominating two-year run through the regional debate ranks. Competing at tournaments in the states of Washington and Oregon, they posted a 46-round winning streak that began in September 2001.
Other Whitman teams competing in last weekend's tournament were Emily Marr and Kyle Krohn, Gareth Campbell and Jeff Buntin, and Katherine Bergh and Alex Bollinger. Other than Marr, a junior, the other competitors are in their first year at Whitman.
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