Pacific Speech & Debate Team Hosts Scheller Invitational, Wins at Home

The Pacific University Speech & Debate Team hosted 23 colleges and universities on the Forest Grove Campus for the Fred Scheller Invitational, Jan. 26-28. Alumni and community members judged more than 20 rounds of competition during the three-day tournament.

Freshman Zoë Kim-Maskell ’21 competed in three events, earning awards in all of them. Kim-Maskell placed fourth in Novice Prose with a selection from Neil Gaiman’s short story Goliath. She also placed fourth in Open Poetry and was the Top Junior competitor in the division. To finish the weekend, Kim-Maskell was an Octafinalist in Novice IPDA debate, losing a close round on the United States’ moral obligation to help Rohingya refugees.

Fellow freshman Avery Beckius ’21 had a competitive weekend as well, placing fifth in Novice Informative. Beckius competed at the Scheller Invitational on Jan. 26 before joining her swimming teammates for a competition against Lewis & Clark the following day.

There were plenty of other highlights:

• Sophomore Kia Addison ‘20 placed third in Poetry Interpretation and narrowly missed Informative Speaking finals by one point.
• Freshman Christiana Warner ’21 placed fifth in Open Program Oral Interpretation. Also competing in debate, Warner was the fourth-ranked speaker in Junior IPDA.
• Sophomore Lillian Wolfe ’20 was the sixth-ranked speaker in Novice IPDA and nearly joined Kim-Maskell in elimination rounds as the next-out in debate.

Pacific's other competitors included Hunter Buen ’21, Brooke Roth ’19, Tera Cafro ’20, Olivia Rockwood ’21 and Hanin Najjar ’21.

As the spring semester kicks off, the Speech & Debate Team will take a short break before the final local tournaments of the season at Oregon State University and Mt. Hood Community College in February. Following those tournaments, the team will prepare for its international competition in Montreal in March and NFA Nationals in Oshkosh, Wis., in April.