The Lincoln-Douglas (LD) debate team competed at two travel tournaments which were both held from Oct. 25-28. Members of the team participated in a tournament hosted by The Meadows School in Nevada, while others competed at one hosted by St. Mark’s School of Texas. Debaters who preferred traditional arguments competed in Nevada, while those who liked more innovative arguments went to Texas, strategically aligning themselves with the preferences of the judges at each tournament.

At The Meadows School, in the Varsity LD division, Lilly Stobo ’26 and August Sone ’27 made it to the octofinal rounds, while Daniel Baek ’26 debated until the doubles round. In Novice LD, Trevor Kim ’29 became the tournament champion, while Kayla Lee ’28 and Max Friedman ’29 made it to semifinals and quarterfinals respectively. Meanwhile, in Texas, Presentation Managing Editor William Liu ’25 and Kaison Maruyama ’27 both made it to quarterfinals, with Maruyama winning top speaker. Liu and Maruyama both won bids for the JW Patterson Tournament of Champions to be held April 26-28 next year.

Baek said he felt a sense of accomplishment, especially since the preparation for the competition went well.

“This achievement signals growth,” Baek said. “Last year I would go neutral at every tournament, but this year, reaching elimination rounds indicates that my efforts in debate resulted in some measurable change. I did a lot more preparation for Meadows than I did for other tournaments. Being that it was the last tournament of the year, I refined my unread arguments and drilled them to become familiar with them.”

Baek said he appreciates the warm and diligent atmosphere of the debate team.

“I’m lucky to have made new friends from the team, especially as a new student,” Baek said. “They’ve made me feel welcome and created an activity that I can look forward to after school. Everyone’s also very hard working. Outside of core files prepared by our coaches, the number of arguments that we create is impressive.”