St. Patrick positively influences Minneota’s Speech Invitational Championship
Say what you want — the ‘Luck of the Irish’ was smiling on the Minneota Speech team as they captured the championship at their own Minneota Viking Invitational on, what else — St. Patrick’s Day.
Minneota Attorney John Engels happens to have a wife helping coach the team and also has two kids on the speech squad. So he popped up as the “Leprechaun,” and infected a spirit of the green on everyone.
“Saturday was another first for our team — hosting a varsity meet,” said Coach Kim Gades.
The eight-team meet went to the host Vikings with 87 points.
Others were: 2. Murray County Central 74; 3. Tracy-Milroy-Balaton 62; 4. Montevideo and Fulda 16 each.
Since Minneota was the host school, they declined to keep the champion trophy and it went home with MCC.
“I remember attending a Minneota meet as a competitor, but since I started coaching we haven’t hosted one,” said Gades.
She, assistant coach Amanda Engels and a couple others donned the traditional green to make this meet a special “St. Patrick’s Day” event for everyone.
“The snow caused us to lose several meets this year, so we thought we’d give it a try,” she said.
“We had over 120 competitors from eight schools attend,” Gades added.
Minneota came home with six champions.
They were:
Duo Interpretation: Brenden Kimpe and Jacob Haen.
Extemporaneous Reading: Cora Engels.
Extemporaneous Speaking: Brenden Kimpe.
Humorous Interpretation: Jacob Haen.
Informative Speaking: Sean Dilley.
Prose Reading: Ben Engels.
Other top finishes for Minneota included:
Creative Expression: Cecilia Rabaey, second; Sarah Engels, sixth.
Discussion: Trevor Belaen, third; Ryan Vlaminck, fourth.
Duo Interpretation: Natalie Bot and Tara Thooft, third.
Great Speeches: Sarah Engels, second; Emma Lipinski, third.
Humorous Interpretation: Teagan Welsh, second; Ella Bot, fifth.
Informative Speaking: Rachel Engels, second.
Original Oratory: Alyssa Engels, second.
Poetry Reading: Natalie Bot, fifth.
Prose Reading: Morgen Wersal fifth.
Storytelling: Zoe DeBoer, third.
“Everything was smooth sailing thanks to the many volunteers,” said Gades.
She added, “It was great to have so many family members, friends and alumni back at school for the speech meet.”
The speech team is back in action on Saturday at the SMSU Invitational in Marshall.
They will be hosting their annual “Speech & Sweets,” on Monday, April 2 at 5 p.m. at the high school.
Speech team photo: Members of the Minneota speech team are: (front row, left to right) Sean Dilley, Katie Walerius, Brenden Kimpe, Morgen Wersal, Teagan Welsh, Cecilia Rabaey, Natalie Bot, Tara Thooft, Zoe DeBoer, Joe Voit, Joey Clark.
Back Row: Coach Kim Gades, Rachel Engels, Ella Bot, Thomas Belaen, Ben Engels, Jacob Haen, John Engels, Ryan Vlaminck, Trevor Belaen, Emma Lipinski, Alyssa Engels, Cora Fischer, Cora Engels, Sarah Engels and Coach Amanda Engels.