Team brings home hardware

Sonja Karp
NLJ Sports Reporter
 
The Dogie Speech team just keeps getting better as the weeks go by, and last weekend they put up their best performance of the season in their meet at Rapid City Stevens.
Though the tournament directors did not tally a Sweepstakes award for team placing, Newcastle brought home the most hardware in terms of individual awards thus far, with six placing in solo events and two duo teams honored.
“It was exciting how well we did,” exclaimed head coach Jim Stith. “The tournament was a little weird with how they reported results, which kept us in the dark with how our kids were progressing, so when we saw the final results, it was pretty awesome!”
Markie Whitney was the top finisher for the team taking first in Congress. Shelby Davis was close behind in that event finishing fourth, and Asia Graham nabbed her first hardware by placing 13th.
“All year, Markie has been up in the top echelon of competitors in Congress so it was really exciting that at this tournament she was number one,” Stith smiled. “Both she and Shelby gave ranking speeches in all three of their rounds so that was awesome as well.”
The duo of Whitney and Davis also placed seventh in Public Forum Debate, while the team of Austyn Vaughn and John Barker finished fifth in Duet.
Freshman Maggie Lorenz was seventh in Drama in what was her first foray into that venue, while Derrick Rasmussen and Graham finished eighth and 11th respectively in Lincoln/Douglas Debate.
Coming up on the 8th and 9th of February is Newcastle’s local tournament, and Stith and his team are still in need of judges. Specifically, there is a shortage of judges for the Saturday morning rounds so if anyone is interested, please contact either Jim or Lexie Stith at NHS by calling 746-2713.