Four members of the debate team reached elimination rounds at the Tournament of Champions in Lexington, Kentucky, on April 27-29.

Jaya Nayar ’20, Alexandra Mork ’20, Spencer Paul ’19 and Indu Pandey ’18 all cleared to elimination rounds, each with a record of four wins out of six preliminary debates. Nayar, Mork and Paul reached double-octafinals, and Indu Pandey ’18 made it to octofinals with 16 remaining competitors.

Pandey also won the third speaker award out of the 88 participants in the event.

University of Kentucky hosted the annual event, which had divisions for 13 total speech and debate events.

The Tournament of Champions requires two qualifying bids to participate, making it the most exclusive tournament in the nation. The Harvard-Westlake team collected a total of 31 bids, making it the debate season’s bid leader with the next closest school trailing by 11 bids. Harvard-Westlake also was the school with the most students qualified to compete this year, sending 10 students to the tournament.