A massive field of 114 extempers gathered for last weekend’s Yale Invitational, the kickoff to the extemporaneous speaking season in New England and the second National Points Race event on the 2024-2025 calendar.
The in-person event had familiar faces as three of the finalists were also in the final round of the online National Speech and Debate Season Opener. Robert Zhang of Elkins High School (TX) notched another national circuit win, winning a tiebreaker over fellow Texan Waleed Haider of Hendrickson High School. Zhang and Haider, who entered elimination rounds with six others in first place, ended the tournament with identical composites in the cumulative tournament that counts ranks from preliminary rounds through the final round. The tie was broken by final round performance, which Zhang won by two ranks. That happened despite Haider capturing two first place ranks among the five final round judges, making him the only finalist to win multiple first place ranks. Zhang follows in the footsteps of Amy Cao of Ridge High School (NJ), who won the first two National Points Race tournaments last year.
One rank behind Zhang and Haider was Aparna Iyer of Ridge High School, who came close to delivering the school its second Yale championship in as many years. And two more ranks behind was Charlotte Reitman of NSU University School (FL). Reitman won two National Points Race events last year at the Florida Blue Key and the University of Kentucky Tournament of Champions (TOC).
Anish Mehta of Scarsdale High School (NY) and Sahana Srikanth of Mason High School (OH) finished much further back of Zhang by 17 and 22 ranks, respectively. Srikanth was making a second National Points Race final round this season after coming within one rank of defeating Zhang at the Season Opener.
Tea Shouldice of Half Hollow Hills East High School (NY), the defending National Speech and Debate Association (NSDA) National Champion in United States Extemp, started her season off with a semi-final finish.
Scarsdale High School the best showing among schools in attendance, placing six extempers in the elimination rounds.
Since Yale was a fourth tier event all of the extempers who reached finals and semi-finals will earn points. The first National Points Race standings will be released after the New York City Invitational in a few weeks, thereby giving the initial release more data.
Here are the results of the 2024 Yale Invitational (Click here for tab sheet):
Champion: Robert Zhang (Elkins High School, Texas)
2nd: Waleed Haider (Hendrickson High School, Texas)
3rd: Aparna Iyer (Ridge High School, New Jersey)
4th: Charlotte Reitman (NSU University School, Florida)
5th: Anish Mehta (Scarsdale High School, New York)
6th: Sahana Srikanth (Mason High School, Ohio)
Semi-Finalists
*Shresta Antil (Ridge High School, New Jersey)
*Haotian He (Newton South High School, Massachusetts)
*Daphne Kalir-Starr (The College Preparatory School, California)
*Tea Shouldice (Half Hollow Hills High School East, New York)
*Ellie Sohn (Flintridge Preparatory School, California)
*Al Zaidi (Holy Trinity Episcopal Academy, Florida)
Quarter-Finalists
*Lorenzo Brigode (Regis High School, New York)
*Shriya Dharmapurikar (Durham Academy, North Carolina)
*Kai Forbach (Durham Academy, North Carolina)
*Max Goldstein (Syosset High School, New York)
*Arya Goyal (Scarsdale High School, New York)
*Daniela Holden (Berkeley Carroll School, New York)
*Vahin Kakarla (Olentangy High School, Ohio)
*Robert Liu Meng (Syosset High School)
*Ayan Nallamshetty (Robinson High School, Florida)
*Harry Reitman (NSU University School, Florida)
*Nathan Thomas (La Salle College High School, Pennsylvania)
*Venya Tiwari (Millburn High School, New Jersey)
Octa-Finalists
*Shreyas Baghel (America Heritage School – Broward, Florida)
*Josef Bell (Berkeley Carroll School, New York)
*Jonah Downs (Trinity Preparatory School, Florida)
*Malk El-Abtah (Syosset High School, New York)
*John Facchini (Regis High School, New York)
*John Germak (Regis High School, New York)
*David Hanley (Western High School, Florida)
*Aanya Jain (American Heritage School – Broward, Florida)
*Sabrina Kaiser (American Heritage School – Palm Beach, Florida)
*Layden Kennedy (Scarsdale High School, New York)
*Sophie Lammer (Scarsdale High School, New York)
*Eduardo Michelsen (Ransom Everglades High School, Florida)
*Michael Mikati (American Heritage School – Palm Beach, Florida)
*Kajal Parmar (Cary Academy, North Carolina)
*Katherine Simpson (Scarsdale High School, New York)
*Aanya Venkat (Arizona College Preparatory Academy, Arizona)
*Myles Vuong (Stuyvesant High School, New York)
*Noah Wintrob (Scarsdale High School, New York)
*Hilary Yum (Vancouver Debate Academy, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada)
*Felicia Zhongzhang (Bronx High School of Science, New York)
Extemp Central thanks the Yale University for posting the results of the tournament online.