Four Havre speech students qualify for state

Press release

The Havre High School speech and debate team saw success at the Class A eastern divisional tournament over the weekend, qualifying four students in three entries for the Class A state tournament this week with one student nearly winning a divisional championship.

The top 12 in each event from each division earned a place at state.

“This was a good result after a good invitational season,” head coach Tim Leeds said. “I was hoping to have a couple of divisional champions, we had the talent for that, but our debaters did a good job in the rounds they were in.”

Senior LilliaAnn Mecklenburg, a four-year debater for Havre, was one of three debaters who went undefeated in the first three rounds of Lincoln-Douglas debate at divisionals, an online tournament hosted by Billings Central High School. Mecklenburg defeated debaters from Laurel, Sidney and Fergus high schools, including receiving perfect marks in the rounds in the rounds against Sidney and Fergus. 

Mecklenburg then lost a close round against another Laurel debater, a round to determine which debater would go to finals to debate for the divisional championship. She ended in third place.

Sophomore Paige Bertelsen, a second-year Havre debater, earned a 10th-place finish in Lincoln-Douglas out of the 14 competitors in the event at the eastern divisional tournament.

Bertelsen went 1-3, receiving compliments and good speaker points from judges in three close rounds against debaters from Fergus, Laurel and Lockwood and earning a win against a Sidney debater.

Juniors Tanion Kaftan, a third-year debater, and Riley Klein, a first-year Havre competitor, went 1-3 at the tournament to finish in sixth place out of the seven teams in public forum debate.

Kaftan and Klein beat a team from Sidney but lost rounds against Fergus, Billings Central and East Helena.

The Havre debaters now compete in the online Class A state tournament, with two rounds in the evenings of Thursday and Friday and rounds scheduled all day Saturday.