Huron Speech & Debate team finishes fourth

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HURON — The Huron Speech & Debate team traveled to the final Central Forensic Conference (CFC) Tournament on Feb. 3 in Brandon Valley.
Overall, the HHS team finished fourth in the conference, ending a 31-year streak of achieving first or second place finishes in the CFC for the team.
“While we did make up some ground, we just couldn’t overcome the deficit to extend the streak,” said head coach Mitch Gaffer. “It was not for lack of effort by the team.
There were more than a few late evenings that found students in the debate room, writing arguments and writing frontline briefs,” he added. “We even had a student, Sofia Ledeneva, who learned how to do extemp speaking four days before this tournament to give us a Novice Extemp entry and gain every point we could.”
Gaffer said the team gave it their all every step of the way.
“And when you do your best and put it all on the table, you can be happy with your finish,” he said. “We finished fourth out of 14 teams in the CFC conference. We can be proud of that.”
Final standings for the 2017-2018 season are:
1- SF Roosevelt (414 points)
2- Brookings (358)
3- Yankton (330)

4- Huron (293)
5- Harrisburg (236)
6- SF O’Gorman (225)
7- Mitchell (182)
8- Tea Area (169)
9- Lennox (164)
10- Dakota Valley (128)
11- Brandon Valley (125)
12- SF Washington (109)
13- SF Christian (107)
14- Vermillion (0)
 Top finishers for Huron:
• In Programmed Oral Interp, Jasmine Snow placed second.
• In Duet Interp, Jasmine Snow & Reese Uecker placed third.
• In Varsity Oratory, Sofia Ledeneva placed fourth.
• In Humorous Interp, Reese Uecker placed fifth.
“We had some success in the speech events but in debate we’re still coming home with 2-2 records and buried in the middle,” Gaffer said. “We’ll be working hard to find a strategy that can push us over the top in these close rounds.”
The next tournament for the team will be the Harrisburg Rushmore Challenge Tournament on Feb. 9-10.

COURTESY PHOTO
Reese Uecker and Jasmine Snow, members of the Huron High School Speech & Debate team,  are shown holding their trophies following the final Central Forensic Conference tournament held last weekend in Brandon Valley.