Speech team golden at home meet

Led by Mason Gedlaman, Alex Damon and the policy debate team of Meredith Stolte and Colin Norick, the Columbia Falls speech and debate team easily won their home meet.

Gedlaman took first place in both humorous oral interpretation and impromptu speaking during the Nov. 2 competition.

Damon took first in memorized public address, and Stolte and Norick nabbed a gold in policy debate.

The team racked up 160 points. Stevensville was a distant second with 76 points and Polson was third with 33. Bigfork won the Class B competition with 46, and Ronan had nine.

“The tournament displayed the talents of many strong competitors across the teams,” coach Tara Norick said. “We really appreciate the strong support from the community filling all of the needed judging hours. The tournament ran very smoothly, which is only possible with great community support.”

The team travels to Corvallis Friday and Saturday.

Other Columbia Falls results included:

Lincoln-Douglas debate

4th Allison Foust

7th Shelby Greene

8th Maddie Mantell

Policy debate

1st Meredith Stolte & Colter Norick

2nd Annabel Conger & Colin Norick

3rd Mara Barnes & Monique Schoech

6th Tya Bonawitz & Hailey Lemburg

7th Estevon Torres & Danny Morgan

8th Mark Shamp & Tim Ingham

Original oratory

3rd Ali Gould

5th Chloe Foster

6th Kendra Skelton

Memorized public address

2nd Breanna Friar

Impromptu speaking

5th Henry Chisholm

6th Cody Phillips

Expository speaking

6th Samantha Gilk

Humorous oral interpretation

4th Lexi Corbett

7th Jerelyn Jones

Serious oral interpretation

2nd Bailey Duke

4th Garrett Role

Extemporaneous speaking

2nd Henry Chisholm

3rd Cody Phillips

4th Emily Getts