MSU Reaches Finals of Harvard, Maintains Second Place in the Nation!

The junior-senior team of Eric Lanning and Carly Wunderlich followed up their impressive win at Kentucky by winning all eight of their preliminary debates at the Harvard University tournament, held the final weekend of October, and then reaching the Finals before losing to Emory University.

Their streak of wins at the Harvard Tournament included victories over some of the most highly ranked teams in the country, including the University of California at Berkeley (currently ranked #3), Northwestern University (#4), the University of Mary Washington (#7), Whitman College (#8), Wake Forest (#10), the University of Oklahoma (#12), and the University of Kansas (#13)

In light of this performance, MSU retained its #2 ranking in the latest national Coaches Poll.

MSU Reaches Semifinals of Wayne State Tournament!

During the weekend of October 24-26, three MSU teams attended the regional tournament held annually at Wayne State University. All three teams - the all-freshmen team of Katie Stoecker and Val McIntosh, the freshmen-sophomore team of Michael Leap and Josh Miller, and the freshmen-junior team of Allen Lin and Katie Klante - won at least half of their eight preliminary debates, and both the teams of Leap-Miller and Klante-Lin reached elimination rounds.

Leap and Miller had a particularly strong showing at Wayne, reaching the semifinal round with wins over teams from the Univeristy of Iowa and Illinois State University.

The MSU students also dressed up to honor the annual Wayne State costume contest during the pre-Halloween weekend - click here to see photos from the tournament!

MSU Wins Kentucky Tournament!

Lanning and Wunderlich with the first place trophy

Senior Carly Wunderlich (Brookfield, WI) and junior Eric Lanning (The Woodlands, TX) took home the first place trophy from the Henry Clay debates hosted annually at the University of Kentucky during the first weekend of October. In order to do so, they emerged from a field of over 130 teams and defeated the teams ranked 1 (University of Texas-Dallas), 2 (Northwestern University), 3 (Emory University), and 4 (University of California-Berkeley) entering into the tournament.

This is the first time that MSU has won the Kentucky tournament in its nearly forty years of existence!