Greenhill Debate Team Continues Successful 2015-16 Season

For the fifth consecutive year, the Greenhill Debate Team claimed the Barkley Forum for High Schools title, which was held last weekend at Emory University in Atlanta, Ga.Senior Graham Baker `16 captured the Lincoln Douglas Debate championships, besting 110 of the top competitors from across the nation. In the finals, Baker defeated a Harvard Westlake competitor to finish the tournament undefeated. Varad Agarwala `16 was selected as the second speaker and was paired against Baker in the semifinals. Bennett Eckert `16 was the fourth speaker where he was pitted against Baker in the quarterfinal round. At tournaments, Greenhill students do not debate against one another and when teammates are paired against one another, the top seed advances.The Greenhill Debate Team traveled to Los Angeles to compete at the Harvard Westlake LA Challenge Round Robin as well as the Harvard Westlake Invitational during the Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday weekend. In Los Angeles, Eckert and Agarwala finished as the first and second speaker, respectively. The Greenhill teammates "closed out" the final round of the LA Challenge after defeating some of the top debaters in the country in the process. At the Invitational, Agarwala earned tournament championship honors was Eckert reached the quarterfinals.Baker, Agarwala and Eckert have posted a record-breaking season as the Greenhill trio have won five tournaments (St. Mark's, Apple Valley, The Glenbrooks, Harvard Westake and Emory), which are designated by the Tournament of Champions as Octofinal Level Events (the top-tier events in the country). The teammates have each won an Octofinal Level Event individually, a rare accomplishment for three students from the same school. In three of the five major events this season, Greenhill teammates have been paired against one another in earlier elimination rounds, which impacted their ability to "close out" the final round.In December, the Greenhill Debate Team traveled to Des Moines, IA, where they competed against over 150 policy debaters from around the country at the Dowling Catholic Tournament, Grace Kuang `17 and Sidarth Subramanian `17 finished third overall after dropping a close 2-1 decision to the eventual tournament champions. Diego Marrero `17 and Kevin Wei `16 finished ninth after dropping a contested 2-1 decision in the octofinals. Kuang finished as the fifth-place speaker while Subramanian earned seventh-place speaker honors.Click here to read the Dallas Morning News Blog.