Havre High speech team wins in Conrad

Press release

The Havre High School speech and debate team took an even smaller team Saturday to its second tournament of the season, an immense Class BC meet at Conrad, and still saw great success.

The Havre team won the Class A sweepstakes award with 29 points, defeating Class A Central Division rivals Fergus County High School from Lewistown and Browning High School, which earned 18 and 7 points, respectively.

Head coach Tim Leeds said he was very pleased with how the Havre competitors performed.

“Even with small teams due to conflicting events, we are winning events and pulling in a bunch of points,” Leeds said. “I am looking forward to seeing how we do after the Thanksgiving break when most of our team should be able to be back on the roster and competing at these meets.”

Senior Ethan Smith led the way for Havre’s five competitors in Conrad, bringing home a trophy in dramatic oral interpretation of literature. Veteran speaker Smith earned almost perfect scores in the three preliminary rounds with two first-place and one second-place ranking, then earned three ones from the panel of finals-round judges. Smith beat out 20 other dramatic interpers at the meet for his first-place finish.

Veteran competitor Jesse Riska, also a senior, took second in memorized public address, while second-year competitor Kaleb Gardner, a sophomore, went 2-1 in Lincoln-Douglas debate competing against 13 other LDers to earn a fourth-place finish.

In impromptu, third-year Havre speaker Johhny Valadez, a junior, took fifth while junior Brady Ophus, competing at his second meet for Havre and his first in impromptu, beat out three other competitors to break into finals and ended up in eighth place.

The Blue Ponies now have two weeks off before heading to the Shelby High School invitational tournament Dec. 3.