Three junior varsity debaters tied for the individual junior top speaker award during last weekend’s online debate tournament hosted by Gonzaga University.

Freshmen Caylee Norris and John Gardner, and senior Larisa Perez received awards for clarity and organization of their arguments.

Norris said she believes her placement was due to a combination of her abilities to build on previous arguments and deconstruct evidence presented during the rounds. 

In one round, Norris emphasized an economic argument she made with examples of real life applications of the concept and why the argument mattered. It won her team the round. 

She and her partner, freshman Marisol Saez, finished with a record of 3-2. This was their first tournament working as a pair. 

“I think being in a pair of two instead of three helped because it made us more reliant on each other,” Norris said. “I felt the improvement from last time and even in just the two days on this one.”

Though Norris has experience debating in high school, Saez started debate this semester.

“My voice wasn’t shaking when I was speaking this time, and I could answer questions,” Saez said.

For Saez, the best moment of this tournament was a rebuttal speech she made based on a single line written in her notes.

“It was an in-the-moment thing, we hadn’t pre-scripted it, which made it so much better,” Saez said.

According to Norris, Saez’s speech shows how she’s already putting lessons into practice. Expanding arguments based on initial claims is something the team’s been working on since the first tournament.

“Before the tournaments, confidence was really low,” Norris said. “But it got much higher. Fake it till you make it, and I think we made it.”

Gardner and Perez placed second in the team JV league with a 4-1 record.

Another JV pair, freshmen Jonah Meduna and Lincoln Young, finished with a 2-3 record. Neither of them had experience debating before college, and they said they’re still learning how the format works. 

Meduna, who did competitive speaking in high school, said college debate is different from what he had done.

“I started out really unsure, everything was kinda abstract,” Meduna said. “But within the third or fourth rounds, I definitely became more confident in finding evidence.”

The teams debated the fall 2025 Collegiate Advocacy Research and Debate resolution: “The United States should substantially promote greater unionization by implementing the Protecting the Right to Organize Act or facilitating sectoral bargaining.”

All varsity teams who competed ended with a 3-2 record.

Sophomore and varsity team member Kate Klein said she’s proud of how well she and her partner sophomore Ewan McNamara performed. 

“I’m very proud of our record,” Klein said. “Especially for it being our second time in varsity. I think Ewan and I gave some of the best speeches and cross-examinations we have ever done.”

Kirstin Kiledal, professor of rhetoric and head debate coach, said she believes this tournament went well.

“Right now we’re at the period where everybody is getting more familiar with the library of sources and how other teams are using the same materials,” Kiledal said. 

The team will compete in-person at the University of Minnesota Nov. 15–16.