"March Madness" Becomes Literal Term For Speech Team

Article by Alannah Goode

Norfolk High School (NHS) sports teams are deserving of all of their praises, what with the Norfolk Boys’ Swim team achieving runner-up at State Championships and the Norfolk Boys’ Basketball team winning state champion at State Championships. However, there is a group that deserves the honor to be mentioned, and that group is the NHS Speech team.

The last weekend of February was the National Speech & Debate Association National Qualifier Tournament, and the event brought forth much success for the team. Thirteen of the events advanced to “out rounds,” five of which made it to finals. Skyler Gubbels finished 6th in oratory, Natalie Reynolds claimed fifth in domestic extemporaneous speaking, Brent Uhing placed fourth in program oral interpretation, Ethan Carlson and Gubbels caught fourth in dual interpretation, and lastly, Uhing and Treslyn Hubbard won second in dual interpretation, which means that the two qualify for the national tournament in Birmingham, Alabama. The national tournament will be taking place on Sunday, June 11th to Friday, June 16th.

And the success did not stop there however, because Coach Peggy Belt snagged the name of NSDA Speech Coach of the Year, and Uhing was named Nebraska NSDA District Student of the Year.

The month of March could best be described as a busy one for the NHS Speech team. The first weekend of March was the Panther Classic, which was hosted at NHS and brought in over 500 students from 39 teams. In Champs Finals, Kaci Zarek and Adison Cassity placed sixth in informative and poetry, respectively. Lloyd Manansala also captured sixth in Merit Finals for entertainment. And coming in hot in third place in Champs Finals, the OID team of Gubbels, Logan Brtek, Oliver Kumm, and Jeremiah Finely finished off strong.

Continuing on, on Friday, March 10, NHS also hosted the Speech Showcase at 7:00 p.m., and the public was able to come and watch the talented students perform. Saturday, March 11th brought forth the NSAA A-1 District Speech Contest at NHS that same weekend. The top four in each event will advance to the NSAA State Competition, taking place on Thursday, March 23rd.

Some say March Madness is for basketball, but the term fits the NHS Speech team and its activities to a “T.” NHS and the Norfolk community are all proud of the members, but no one can be prouder of them than Mrs. Belt, their coach. She sums it up in one simple sentence, and one simple sentence is all she needs.

“It has been such an exciting team and a fun group to coach,” Belt said.

For more great articles written by NHS Students, see the March 2017 Panther Newspaper!