Third Barlow v. Barlow Final Caps Unprecedented Regular Season

Barlow's debate team made history this past weekend in which Barlow students took first-place honors at two tournaments. At an extemporaneous policy debate at Pomperaug High School, eight Barlow varsity debaters went undefeated taking first, second, fourth and fifth place. And the next day, two students earned awards at a speech tournament at the Kingswood-Oxford School.

The event at Pomperaug was the last regular season tournament of the year in the Connecticut Debate Association calendar. The question of the day was whether or not the United States should allow itself to intervene militarily in other countries. When the dust settled, four of the five undefeated teams were from Barlow. Even more remarkable was the fact that the match up for the exhibition final were two pairs from Barlow. Again.

Intra-school finals are historically rare, occurring only when the top two teams at the end of the preliminary rounds happen to be from the same school. Barlow, despite its success taking four state titles in the last five years, has never managed the feat until this past October. But it happened again in mid-February at their home tournament, and now it happened a third time at Pomperaug, a first in the league's history.

So for the third time, a quartet of Barlow seniors has dueled for the top prize. In an event unprecedented in league history, seniors Cormac Cummiskey and Cooper D'Agostino faced their classmates Brendan Coppinger and Nicolò Marzaro in the final round. Cormac & Cooper won the toss, opting for side affirmative, arguing that the United States should no longer go it alone and intervene militarily in another country.

Cummiskey lead off, more animated and assured than ever before, pummeling his opponents with mountains of historical examples, including the story of how U.S. intervention in Afghanistan in the 1980s came back to bite us on 9/11. By supporting the Mujahadeen, we laid the ground work for al Qaeda.

Coppinger fought back hard, explaining how a no-fly zone and targeted strikes against Libya helped topple Qadaffi and how and special forces operations like the Seal Team 6 mission to capture or kill Osama bin Laden were the type of surgical strikes favored by their side. The days of open-ended commitments to quagmires were over as far as he was concerned.

D'Agostino, however, would have none of it, delivering a powerful and detailed lecture explaining step-by-step how America's mission creep in Vietnam transformed a small strike into total war, needlessly claiming the lives over a million people. Cormac powerfully reinforced the point in his best rebuttal to date, driving home the view that America as repeatedly got ensnared in large quagmires with policies that began as small operations. "We didn't learn our lesson a hundred years ago in the Philippines. We didn't learn our lesson in Vietnam. We didn't learn our lesson in Iraq. And now they expect you to believe that magically we'll suddenly get it right this time. It's the very definition of insanity to pursue the same policy over and over and expect a different result!"

Marzaro tried to save it for his side, describing how our limited engagements in Libya prove that America can restrain itself from being dragged into extended conflicts. He also pointed out that participating in international coalitions like the one the successful mission in the former Yugoslavia cannot be the only approach. He contrasted it with the international community's inability to agree on a strategy for Rwanda, and how that caused the world to stand idly by as 900,000 people perished.

It was a close call, but the judges voted for Cormac and Cooper again, putting them in first place in varsity for the third time this season. Cormac's near-perfect 88 points earned him the first-place varsity speaker trophy and Nicolò finished in second place. Five of the top ten varsity speakers were from Barlow including D'Agostino in fifth, Coppinger in ninth, and sophomore Sam Aldershof in tenth.

Other Barlow varsity teams were not far behind the quartet, many of them putting up their best scored to date. Junior Nicole Peterson and sophomore Sam Aldershof fulfilled their long-time ambition of going undefeated, finishing in fourth place overall. Just behind them were seniors Caroline Ryng and Ben Lewson in fifth.

Six more varsity speakers turned in strong 2-1 records including juniors Tommy Cocco, Daanish Siddiqi, Carl Goldstine along with sophomores Hunter Lightman, Will Tower, and Harrison von Dwingelo. Junior David Freeman with sophomores Brooke Curto, and Michael Lin all fought valiantly against tough opponents.

In novice competition, sophomores Nathan Sobel, Sam Nogueiera, Shawn Burger and Valerie Boczar all had a win for the day.

And on Sunday, a few hearty souls travelled to Kingswood-Oxford tournament in West Hartford to spar with students from private academies all over New England. As this public speaking event, students got to stretch beyond the normal, sometimes dry questions of policy debate, instead trying their hand at comedy, ethics, and impromptu speeches on unannounced topics.

Nicolò's persuasive speech about creating a global taboo on the sale of small arms to conflict zones earned him the third-place gavel. It was a dry run for a speech he was trying to perfect for the world championship tournament he will compete in at the end of the month in Durban, South Africa.

Sophomore Michael Lin got his first speaking honors taking the top prize at a new event called 'high-brow, low-brow.' After the regular rounds were over, while students gathered in the auditorium waiting for winners to be announced, the captains of the Kingswood-Oxford team handed randomly selected cards of high-brow and low-brow topics to one student from each school. Whoever gave the most outrageously funny speech linking the two topics would be selected by the host team's captains as the winner.

Michael's talk connected the New York Times to Spam in several ways, first that the NYT is one of the world's largest producers of spam, and second that he believed that both were determined to sell him viagra. His sardonic, deadpan delivery brought down the house with thunderous laughter, and he was awarded equally absurd gifts as his award, a box of golf balls and a tube of bacon-flavored toothpaste.

Other highlights were Sam Aldershof who got high marks with an edgy, comedic performance of an after-dinner address to a fictitious International Hide & Seek Federation. In it, he announced whether Julian Assange, Joseph Kony, or the Emeritus Pope Benedict XVI would succeed Osama bin Laden as the league's champion. Senior Ben Lewson shined giving a sarcastic orientation address for the U.S. Congress. Junior Hana Malik got high scores arguing for increased respect women's rights in Islamic countries. Sophomore Brooke Curto did well explaining how to solve ethical dilemmas with different philosophies.

On March 23, ten students from Barlow will travel to Wilton to defend their state title, hoping to keep it for the third year in a row.