National Debate Tournament / End of the Year

The National Debate Tournament, which is one of the three national tournaments and also last tournament of the year, took place over the week of March 30th until April 2nd. The team arrived in Dallas two days prior to the start of the tournament in order to get a jump on preparation for the tournament. Participating in the tournament were the teams of Matt Struth and Kevin Kallmyer and also Nick Ryan and myself. Along with the teams participating, Jason Martin and Clint Woods accompanied the team to provide help researching and coaching during the tournament.

Although neither team managed to reach the elimination, it was a great accomplishment for the team to have qualified two teams to the National Tournament for two years in a row and to have also qualified teams for the fourth consecutive year. A detailed account of the tournament was written by Jason Martin and Clint Woods at the 2007 NDT blog (http://umwndt2007.blogspot.com/).

The National Debate tournament concluded the 2006-2007 debate season for Mary Washington and the rest of the debate squads around the country. The writers at Mary Washington's debate blog would like to thank several people for their contributions over the course of the year.

Scott Berry: Scott concluded his fourth year in debate at Mary Washington and graduated with a double major in Geography and Political Science. Scott was able to balance being on the debate team along with several other activities such as working political campaigns, being an officer in GIANT productions along with several other clubs and activities. Scott's leadership and work proved valuable to the debate team over his four years on the team but more importantly most people would classify Scott as a Dude.

Will Collins: William Forsythe Collins also concluded his fourth year in debate at Mary Washington, graduating with a degree in History. Mr. Collins demonstrated a great passion for the activity and was one of the hardest workers on the team. Will proved to be both an excellent partner and teammate over the course of debate career whose work was invaluable to the success of the team. We would all like to wish Will Collins the best of luck and hope to have Will remain a part of the team as a distinguished alumni.

Adrienne Brovero: Adrienne's dedication and work ethic helped bring about much of the team's success this year. Her efforts in her first year of coaching here went well beyond expectations and were one of the best parts of the 2006-2007 debate year.

Thanks to everyone and here are a few photos from the NDT taken from the Official 2007 NDT site.

The Whole Team

Kevin & Matt

Nick and I

Clint Woods


Jason Martin

Varsity Takes First in National Debate Rankings

The final debate rankings were published for the American Debate Association. The Varsity debate team ranked 1st in the entire country beating out teams such as Harvard, Georgia and the Naval Academy. The rankings are based upon the combined performance of the team over the course of the entire season for debate.

Matt Struth Sits Down

The novice team finished second in the country ranking just behind Liberty University.

Novices Win Rounds

Mary Washington Does Well at A.D.A. Nationals

From March 10^th to March 12^th, Mary Washington competed at the American Debate Association National Tournament which was hosted by Liberty University. The A.D.A. National Tournament is the last tournament of the year for many of the debaters. The team sent a total of five teams to compete in all three divisions.

In the Varsity division, the team of Scott Berry and Will Collins advanced to the elimination rounds where they would face the team of Wayne State BN. Will and Scott defeated the Wayne State team on a 3-0 decision and would advance to debate a Georgia team that is one of the best two teams in the country. Will and Scott would eventually drop a good debate on a 3-0 decision. The team ended a solid debate career with a quality showing at the national tournament. In addition to advancing the quarterfinals, Scott Berry took home 8^th speaker.

In the Junior Varsity division, the Dorrior Coleman and Jason Martin finished prelims with a 3-3 record. The team then picked it up in elimination rounds and ended up advancing to the Semifinals where they would lose to the eventual champions Wake Forest University.

The novice division saw the team of Cassie Carlton and Amanda Gardner advance to the finals of the tournament finishing second. Amanda and Cassie finished the preliminary rounds with a record of 5-1 and both received speaker awards.

Amanda and Cassie's Speaker Awards

Scott Also Pulls in a Speaker Award