Concordia Forensics Team Shatters School Records for Finalists, Nationals Bids

The Concordia University, Nebraska, Speech Team has secured 12 qualifying event bids to the National Forensic Association National Championship, multiple finalist and semifinalist awards, and broken several school records in their first five weekends of competition.

The records broken include breaking the record for number of finalists in a single weekend of competition, number of nationals bids achieved in a single season, and number of nationals bids secured by a single CUNE competitor in a season.

“This is a very strong result for our team, especially with nearly our entire team being in their first or second year of intercollegiate competition,” said Andrew Moffitt, director of forensics. “This is great indicator of our next generation of competitors, and the team is excited to continue to grow and develop as we move forward into second semester.”

Speakers for CUNE have qualified a total of 12 events to the NFA National Championship, which will be held in April at the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire. Sophomore Tationa Trice has qualified 3 events, including a duo event with freshman Faith Osborn. Sophomore Hannah Sugita and senior Musa Fofana each have qualified two events to nationals. Freshmen Lindsay Range, Katie Funk, Payton DeMers-Sahling, Will Helmer, and sophomore Melody Niemoth have qualified for one event so far.

The team has advanced 16 finalists, who have placed in the top 4-6 competitors of their respective event, in five tournaments. This number includes several events that have advanced multiple times to finals, on top of their national qualifying placings.

“With eight tournaments left in the regular season, we expect to grow this list as we debut new event entries and strengthen current events that are showing real promise. The number of current bids this year alone, is more than the last five years combined.”