Three years ago Sam Fairfield and Billy Strong watched as the George Mason University Forensics team passed out amazingly beautiful White Eagles to tournament champions. We came back disappointed we didn't win one despite their great efforts including a 2nd and 3rd place finish.
Last year Sam and Billy combined to win a set of White Eagles in Public Forum debate--the first time GMU has offered the event. We also won a Black Eagle for Billy participating in the prestigious GMU Extemp Round Robin. This year our flock of Eagles has grown even more...
Olivia Sandbothe and Liz McCabe teamed up to preserve Roosevelt's hold as Public Forum Champions. No school has ever won 3 years in a row in any event at Mason and so we have a chance at history next year! That added another pair of Eagles to the flock.
Then Billy Strong pulled off his biggest National Circuit win in extemp twice beating the pre season National Champion favorite! That added a 3rd White Eagle. And...this year Billy took a first place lead in the round robin into the exhibition finals vs. Rebecca Goldstein of Newton South, MA. The exhibition was held in front of a couple of hundred people in a lecture hall including several GMU Deans and faculty members.
Becca won out in the single most exhilierating and hilarious round of extemp I have ever witnessed. Both were on top of their game in both analysis and humor. The lines they got off forced both of them to stop and let the crowd settle down repeatedly.
You'll love these final round questions in the round robin:
Billy: If you could give a nuclear weapon to any country in the world which does not presently possess a nuclear weapon, which nation would you choose and why?
Half in jest and have seriously, Billy stunned the crowd with Iran! He was amazing.
Rebecca: If you could choose America's theme song, what would it be and why?
Becca selected Brittney Spear's Opps! I've Done it Again. She was equally as
entertaining and supported her choice remarkably well.
Let it be said these two both went for it and both took big time chances and pulled off big time speeches.
The Round Robin finalists are both treated as champions and so another White Eagle has landed at Roosevelt.
Chris Oman and Billy also competed in Public Forum debat going 3-2 losing an octo final round to Walt Whitman High School in Bethesda, MD. Liz and Olivia then defeated our "buddies" from Whitman on a 3-0 ballot in quarter finals. Thus, had Chris and Billy won their round, Roosevelt would have had to close out a quarter final. As it turned out Liz and Olivia had (by 1/3 of a pt) the better speaks and we would have closed to them anyway.
Also impressive were the quarterfinal finishes of Olivia and Chris in Extemp. They were in the same quarter final round facing 4 national level speakers. Billy went first in his quarter, semi and final rounds--pretty amazing considering 18 or so of the top extempers in the nation were at Mason. All 3 were very solid in prelims.
These 4 students produced a 40-10 record in 50 rounds of debate and extemp.
By the way, Roosevelt was 19th in sweeps with only 4 students. There were 67 schools at George Mason this year from 20 states totaling over 1000 entries.
And on top of all of that, Liz and Olivia pick up a TOC debate bid for their win!
Coach Harry
