Upholding the tradition
While Wooster High School’s sports teams have been tremendously successful over the years, one team at the high school has the kind of storied history needed to be called a national powerhouse.The Wooster High School Speech and Debate team.
“I think history and tradition is what we are all about,” said head coach Ned Lauver during the team’s annual pre-season picnic at Freedlander Park on August 9.
“This team has eight decades of tradition behind it,” Lauver told the returning and prospective team members, noting that the team has won three state titles within the last decade.
But the team’s history goes back much further than that.
According to Lauver, WHS hosted the National Forensics League (NFL) national tournament in the 1930s, before it grew too large to be hosted in a small community.
It is at the NFL national tournament that Wooster High School has shined on the national stage.
Lauver also explained that WHS holds a national record for the most appearances at the national tournament of any high school in the country, public or private.
The team reached the milestone of 60 appearances at the national tournament this summer when three students – Kellen Reusser, Maggie Eby and Mara Weber – competed at the NFS national tournament in Kansas City, June 13-18.
Lauver was there to see it all unfold.
“It was really something to hear the executive director of the NFL get on stage and in front of 2000 people at the awards ceremony announce Wooster High School as having the most appearances at the national tournament of any high school in America,” said Lauver, adding that WHS was honored with a standing ovation for its six decades at the tournament.
It’s one of those moments Lauver will never forget.
The three WHS competitors provided their own special moments for Lauver.
The Policy Debate team of Eby and Weber was the only Ohio team to reach the elimination rounds at the tournament, placing them among the top 60 teams in the nation.
Reusser went even further into the tournament and reached the semi-finals. Out of the 220 competitors in the Humorous Interpretation category, Reusser placed eighth in the nation.
“What an amazing accomplishment,” said Lauver of Reusser’s performance. “As a coach you can go your whole career without ever seeing one of your students even make it to nationals, let alone place top ten.”
“That’s the kind of stuff Wooster students can do,” Lauver told his team. “If you want to see how high you can climb, we try to provide you with that opportunity to do so. Wooster students can and do do that on a regular basis.”
“Hopefully you recognize that this event is special here in Wooster, that the team is a special opportunity and that you have the opportunity to be a part of the best program that has ever existed at Wooster High School,” said Lauver, adding “I say that with a great deal of pride and a great sense of responsibility as the head coach of a program in existence for almost a century now.”
Lauver knows that it will take a team effort to live up to the team’s tradition of excellence again this year.
“This community has one of the proudest traditions of speech and debate of any place in the United States of America,” Lauver said. “If we slip up at any point, if we don’t do our jobs recruiting, performing, coaching; if we don’t do what needs to be done, then that can all go away.”
“It’s on all of us – coaches, students and parents – to maintain that tradition,” concluded Lauver.