This was a mini state tournament giving us our first preview of the best in the State from the 5 major players...Dowling, Valley, West, Indianola and Roosevelt. Plus we saw Wash, Bettendorf and the Davenport Schools as well. Kansas City Central and Chesterton, In make the field even more difficult. So this was a solid, very competative tournament. We did NOT see the Valley varsity CX teams (at New Trier and we did not see the West Varsity debaters since it was their event--we saw their novices and speech kids.)
My initial read is that everyone has their strengths this year and Roosevelt is the youngest of the Varsity teams. West looks very solid in speech and I see another year of a West, Dowling, Roosevelt, Valley, Burlington type of finish at All Iowa finals.
Debate will be very challenging at All Iowa Finals this year. We have no assurance of winning anything. I see Valley/West in LD; Valley/Indianola/Dowling/CR Wash in Policy/who knows in Congress and a Roosevelt/Dowling/Indianola/Valley/West war in PF.
I also see where we have made great progress with our sophomore class. Next year will be a different story in that we will have kids competing for State championships in all divisions.
In the meantime, we have a lot of work in practice if we are to hang on to where we want to be this season...a top five finish.
