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Next season, Extemp Central will redebut the National Points Race, a season long competition that recognizes the extemporaneous speaker who performs the best in a series of national circuit tournaments. The race has not taken place for the last two seasons, but if there was a National Points Race for the 2013-2014 season, what would it look like? Extemp Central has gone through this year’s results and tallied up this season’s rankings heading into the 2014 National Speech and Debate Association (NSDA) National Tournament. The 2011-2012 tier system was used for awarding points and that system will undergo revision for next season.
Here is what the unofficial 2013-2014 National Points Race “Top 25” would look like:
| 1 | Lily Nellans | Des Moines Roosevelt HS (Des Moines, IA) | 717.5 |
| 2 | Miles Saffran | Trinity Preparatory School (Winter Park, FL) | 517.5 |
| 3 | Josh Wartel | Lake Braddock Secondary School (Herndon, VA) | 397.5 |
| 4 | Arel Rende | Booker T. Washington HS (Tulsa, OK) | 294 |
| 5 | Brian Anderson | LaRue County HS (Hodgenville, KY) | 255 |
| 6 | Chase Harrison | Millburn HS (Millburn, NJ) | 250 |
| 7 | Jasper Primack | Newton South HS (Newton, MA) | 191 |
| 8 | Harrison Stall | Southside HS (Greenville, SC) | 150 |
| 9 | Gabe Slater | Denver East HS (Denver, CO) | 130 |
| 10 | Monica Coscia | Montville Township HS (Montville, NJ) | 125 |
| 11 | Will Walker | Fullerton Joint Union HS (Fullerton, CA) | 120 |
| 12 | Justin Graham | Trinity Preparatory School (Winter Park, FL) | 109 |
| 13 | Cameron James Bonnewell | Lake Highland Preparatory (Orlando, FL) | 103 |
| 14 | Charlie Liao | Monte Vista HS (Danville, CA) | 85 |
| 15 | Isabella Paretti | Cypress Bay HS (Weston, FL) | 84.5 |
| 16 | Brian Yu | Monte Vista HS (Danville, CA) | 82 |
| 17 | Christopher Jordan | Brophy College Preparatory (Phoenix, AZ) | 80 |
| 18 | Adam Stromme | Eagan HS (Eagan, MN) | 75 |
| T19 | Davis Larkin | Parish Episcopal School (Dallas, TX) | 75 |
| T19 | Sidarth Singh | Munster HS (Munster, IN) | 75 |
| 21 | Yijia Liang | Upper Arlington HS (Arlington, OH) | 75 |
| 22 | Ben Tobin | Lake Braddock Secondary School (Herndon, VA) | 72 |
| 23 | Elizabeth Kingaby | Central Cabarrus HS (Concord, NC) | 65 |
| 24 | Giancarlo Musetti | Cypress Bay HS (Weston, FL) | 62 |
| 25 | Nida Ansari | Riverside HS (Greer, SC) | 60 |
Lily Nellans of Des Moines Roosevelt High School (IA) would have a substantial lead heading into this year’s NSDA National Tournament. Nellans has four wins in National Points Race tournaments this year and her victories at higher tiered events such as the Glenbrooks, the Montgomery Bell Academy Extemp Round Robin, and the Extemp TOC account for her 200 point lead. All of Nellans final round appearances at National Points Race events have been top three showings. The only theoretical way that Miles Saffran of Trinity Preparatory School (FL) could catch Nellans is if Nellans dropped prior to quarter-finals at NSDA Nationals and Saffran won the tournament and the NSDA final round national championship (which is worth twenty-five bonus points).
Based on this year’s top 25, United States Extemp would be receiving the fifty point bonus at NSDA Nationals. In the National Points Race, the NSDA extemp category that has the most participants in the top 25 receives a fifty point bonus, which means that the winner of USX at the 2014 NSDA National Tournament would have received 250 points compared to 200 points for the winner of International Extemp. This would have been the first time in the history of the National Points Race that USX would have received the bonus.
Readers might notice that Adam Stromme of Eagan High School (MN) is ranked eighteenth despite having the same amount of points as three other extempers on the list. Stromme is eighteenth because he has a victory at a National Points Race tournament, which serves the first tiebreaker. Davis Larkin of the Parish Episcopal School (TX) and Sidarth Singh of Munster High School (IN) are tied for nineteenth over Yijia Liang of Upper Arlington HS (OH) because they each have one final round appearance at a National Points Race tournament, which Liang does not have.
The top underclassmen in this year’s unofficial points race? Josh Wartel of Lake Braddock Secondary School (VA), Brian Anderson of LaRue County High School (KY), and Jasper Primack of Newton South High School (MA) lead the list and will likely figure prominently into next year’s rankings.
Can you name all of the previous winners of the Extemp Central National Points Race (2009-2012)?
[toggle title_open=”Close Me” title_closed=”Open Me” hide=”yes” border=”yes” style=”default” excerpt_length=”0″ read_more_text=”Read More” read_less_text=”Read Less” include_excerpt_html=”no”]2012-Lily Nellans (Des Moines Roosevelt High School, Iowa)
2011-Nathaniel Donahue (Durham Academy, North Carolina)
2010-Jacob Baker (Bellarmine College Preparatory, California)
2009-Stacey Chen (North Allegheny Senior High School, Pennsylvania)[/toggle]
More information about the 2014-2015 National Points Race will be revealed in August.