Post date: Dec 20, 2013 5:41:21 PM
Interpers Bring Home the Hardware
by Jordan Smith, staff
After a successful regular season, the Interp team was feeling good going to the State Interp Festival in Watertown. Competitors included President Ryan Honaker (12) in Humor, Lexi Eakins (12) in Poetry, Secretary Ethan Marsland (12) in Non-Original Oratory, the duo of Sam Ricci (12) and Chris Wheeler (11) in Duet, Seth Gerberding (11) in Serious Prose, Willow Cowherd (11) in Dramatic Plays and the Readers Theatre of Ricci, Vice-President Jordan Smith (11), Olivia Lyle (10), Wheeler, Cowherd, and Gerberding.
Sturgis falls into the AA classification, and is automatically qualified for State in every event annually. At State, rankings are not given for awards, but rather “Superiors.” To receive a Superior, a piece must have two of three judges designate it as Superior.
On the first day, Dec. 6, Marsland started the team strong by winning a Superior. While Cowherd did not receive a Superior in Dramatic Plays, she did garner an overall “excellent” (the level below Superior) rating. Rounding out the night, the Reader’s Theatre took a Superior for the first time in Coach Megan Jones’ tenure, receiving all three Superiors.
On the morning of the second day, Honaker and Gerberding performed well for the team by taking Superiors in Humor and Serious Prose. Later in the day, Eakins took an Excellent in Poetry, and for their second year Ricci and Wheeler took a Superior in duet.
While teams are also not ranked, there is an award for teams who do well, called the “Team Excellence Award,” which requires teams in the AA division to receive four Superiors, and A and B schools to receive two. Having taken five Superiors, the team took the award, another first for Jones.
Due to bad weather, Jones decided to caravan home with the team from Rapid City Stevens. Stevens Coach Mark Vargo decided to award Jones the “Penguin Excellence”, an honorary award for the Stevens team.
Regardless of how it is viewed, the interpers have had the best performance in at least seven years, and possibly more. To add to this victory, there is promise of another good season next year, with much of the team being Juniors.