Idaho State University debate team ends fall semester ranked as high as 8th nationally

The Idaho State University debate team of Tony Johnson and Matea Ivanovic is ranked eighth nationally at the end of fall semester in the collegiate debate Bruschke Team Rankings

Over the course of the fall semester, Johnson and Ivanovic won 68 percent of their debates and have a record of 10-3 (76.9 percent) against the current top 16 in the National Coaches Poll.  Also contributing to their eighth-place ranking are a second-place finish at Gonzaga and fifth-place finish at the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.  Johnson and Ivanovic participated in elimination debates at Wake Forest where Johnson was the 23rd speaker out of 284 individual speakers.

Rounding out Bruschke's top 10 are teams from Harvard, Berkeley, Kansas, Emory, Northwestern, Oklahoma, Michigan and Loyola. 

"We are proud to represent Idaho State on a national stage where we can shine brightly among such elite institutions," said Sarah Partlow Lefevre, director of the ISU James M. and Sharon E. Rupp Debate Society.

Team members are currently gearing up for finals and their holiday breaks.  But, they plan to be back in full force next semester where they will attend tournaments at the University of Kentucky, Weber State University, The University of Texas at Dallas and State University New York, Binghamton. 

The Bruschke ranking system evaluates every team who has competed in policy debate nationwide since the beginning of the academic year and was developed by Professor Jon Bruschke from California State University, Fullerton.  His system incorporates the team's overall performance, the quality of tournaments the team attends, win percentages and wins against teams in the top 25. 

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