Yale University was the virtual host for its annual Yale Invitational last weekend, attracting 139 extempers from across the country. McKinley Paltzik of Phoenix Country Day School (AZ) won the tournament for the second consecutive year, besting National Season Opener winner and National Points Race leader Daniel Kind of Lake Highland Preparatory School (FL) by two ranks in the cumulative event.

Paltzik’s victory is the first time that a Yale champion has repeated since Kate Fisher of St. Mary’s Hall (TX) accomplished the feat in 2018.

Since Yale is a cumulative tournament the final round winner is not always the person that emerges as the champion. That was the case this year as Cameron Roberts of Jack C. Hays High School (TX) was victorious in the final round with a twelve composite, two ranks better than Paltzik and three better than Kind. However, not enough ground was made up to win, so Roberts placed fourth behind Paltzik, Kind, and Charles Hou of Plano West Senior High School (TX).

For the second straight weekend, Colorado had a finalist in a National Points Race event. This time it was Peter Alisky of Smoky Hill High School, Colorado’s reigning state champion in United States Extemp, who placed fifth.

Solon High School (OH) continued its run of placing extempers in the top tier of national circuit events. Vikram Sundaram, who placed sixth at the University of Kentucky two weeks ago in the Season Opener, replicated that finish at Yale. Sundaram’s teammates Dev Ahuja and Michelle Park reached the semi-final round.

Other notables fell short of making the final round at Yale. These included last year’s NSDA International Extemp final round winner Mukta Dharmapurikar of Durham Academy (NC), who dropped in semis; NSDA United States Extemp national finalist Katelyn Cai of BASIS Scottsdale (AZ), who dropped in octo-finals; and NSDA International Extemp semi-finalist and Season Opener third place finisher Marc Zavarro of Western High School (FL), who dropped in quarter-finals.

Paltzik’s victory at Yale will give them seventy points in this year’s National Points Race. Kind’s second place finish will be enough to keep him on top of the rankings, though, until the New York City Invitational in a few weeks. New National Points Race standings will be released late on Thursday night.

The number of entries at Yale means that all extempers reaching the quarter-finals earned a bid to this year’s University of Kentucky Tournament of Champions (TOC). Quarter-finalists also earn a bid to the Extemp TOC at Northwestern University.

Here are the results of the 2021 Yale Invitational (Click here for tab sheet):

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