On Saturday morning, the principal comes to school to help Daisy set up NSDA Campus in the room where the fundraiser is held. And Paige's father coming in to judge rounds at Last Chance in a separate room.
Before game 5 begins, with Albert, Paige, the Congressional players and their respective families coming in, Daisy meets with them:
"My brother said that he never saw a debate round himself, and my parents got me here because my parents claimed it would be good for me, too!" Heather, Albert's younger sister, comments.
"Heather, I'm your brother's main window into this world of nerdiness that you kept hearing about for years. The rest of the debate team seems to live in their own world"
"Good on you, Daisy" Albert meets with Daisy shortly after his sister did. "We just need to get seated; the game will start soon!"
"Good luck, Daisy" Paige then gets seated with her mom, next to Daisy's parents.
The game takes place in a crowded computer lab, with most attendees having never watched a LD round in their lives. Maybe people didn't want to watch me debate the ethics of carbon pricing because they either have their minds made up, they would find it boring or polarizing. Sure, last round might have sounded like debating the implementation of carbon pricing from a policy perspective, but until the game starts, I have no way of knowing how the opponent will approach the topic.
"I kindly request that you keep quiet while the round is underway. You may discuss carbon pricing with her between rounds if you wish" the principal instructs the attendees.
Oh boy. There just isn't a whole lot of people even wanting to discuss carbon pricing in town, at least outside the debate team. And that's what my dad brought me here for? Watching Daisy debate carbon pricing? She might be the smartest girl I can consider my friend, but even I feel like I wouldn't be able to keep up. And I still feel like I'm relatively good at language arts and social studies! Paige starts to ruminate about the principal inviting attendees to discuss the tournament's topic with her.
So while, as Daisy expected, she found the fifth game harder than any of the previous four games at Last Chance, the game still appears to be winnable. However, the attendees appear mostly powerless over the topic, except for the Congressional players and their parents.
When the judgment is passed for the game, Daisy reacts to the verdict:
"Woohoo! I'm advancing to the elims!" she jumps for joy now that she won the required 4 games to advance to either the first playoff round or triple-octos.
So despite losing the sixth prelim game, Daisy still gets a bye for the first round, meaning that she goes straight to triple-octos.
"You see now that debate isn't about talking faster or louder than your opponents, much less shutting them down, or even quarreling. It's about logic and reason. Now, some of you might think that it's an activity that has intense intellectual demands. Yes, it has caused some would-be players to balk at it, and you might think my opponents are more or less at my intellectual or academic level for this reason" Daisy harangues the attendees before tweeting.
I knew that debaters weren't your average students, but Daisy makes me feel like people at Last Chance are nerds, and people at our football opponents get branded nerds without being nearly as smart as she is. And yet, Daisy is obviously brilliant to me, Albert seems a little awestruck by how she describes her debate opponents.
During the two hours she spends in the computer lab, it seems like no one was willing to discuss carbon pricing with her. However, she seems willing to talk about how it feels to her to compete in LD.
"Wouldn't some people on the debate team stick together because they feel it's the only place where they can be themselves at school?" Albert's dad asks her.
"Some of my opponents play for schools where gifted students have it rough, while we seemed to treat the debate team as an offering for gifted students. And give their all while in there when coursework disappoints them. The schools where the widest range of students play debates are those private or magnet schools, or even those schools in more affluent neighborhoods where people put more value in education and extracurricular activities, and you have more of these players who play only for college apps then. But yes, they definitely exist, I am just not one of them"
Daisy and the others are anxiously waiting for her triple-octos matchup, which, after Daisy's tweet, makes the computer lab overcrowded, and forcing VA fans to borrow chairs from other rooms for that game. And, of course, so many VA fans are assembled in a crowded computer lab to watch the first of the two must-win games that Daisy needs to play.
This time around, there are 3 judges per game as opposed to one. The head judge performs the coin toss to determine who will argue which side into the playoffs.
"This is the triple-octofinals in Lincoln-Douglas at the 2027 NSDA Last Chance Qualifier. On the affirmative, we have, from St. Croix Prep in Minnesota, Grant Ormond, on the negative we have, from Venomous Agendas in Louisiana, Daisy Pammant. Best of luck to both debaters" the head judge announces after the coin toss.
Damn it, after everything we heard about VA, they punch well above their weight, and my older sister, Kelsie, told me about how she stretched herself too thin, doing both quiz bowl and policy, losing to VA in both. I already have a lot on my plate with LD alone, Grant then psyches himself up when he hears about the matchup. At the same time, he knows that he's in for a rough game, and both players, really.
So much so that both speakers make really good speeches of their own, and they both feel like the game is far higher-profile than it really is. And, of course, VA fans, who, as usual, are instructed to keep quiet during the games themselves, now get a better idea of what would await Daisy at Nats should she win the berth they all hope for.
Now that's one round that will make me feel like the judges will have a hard time deciding! I must keep in mind the winner can realistically play at Nats, Gaston, a Congressional player, is shakes in his seat while he watches his teammate partake in a verbal joust over the ethics of carbon pricing.
This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.
A little over half an hour later, with both players exhausting their prep time allotments, the verdicts come and...
"The winner is the aff, two to one!" the principal announces to a room full of VA fans, who instantly let their disappointment in Daisy show as their mood has obviously been brought down by Grant's Pyrrhic win.
"What am I going to do now?" Daisy starts crying after this atrociously Pyrrhic defeat. "I did all I could to win... Maybe I should focus on theater for next week!"
Daisy should know this by now, but debaters can shine or choke at random from a tourney to another, Gaston ruminates about this loss.
"How could this happen? It was clear to all of us what promise you had!" a dumbfounded principal asks her, in shock at the defeat. "What a disappointment! I guess this is junior year-Florence all over again..."
Flo lacked the ambition to even attend Last Chance, though. In some ways, Daisy is very much like Flo: she took the result for what it is. On Monday, notwithstanding the debate coach, who will still be over in Lexington by then, the rest of the staff will learn about this defeat... About this game that could have gone either way, the principal ruminates while Daisy is back with Paige.
"Daisy, I won't think less of you because you lost in the elims at a major tournament. It was easy to forget that you were dealing with high schoolers" Paige tries to comfort her.
"Presumably because you think other people at that stage of the tournament operate at a much higher level than typical high schoolers and can clearly operate at a collegiate level in language arts and social studies!" Daisy follows up as most other attendees leave campus.
And now I might be wondering what kind of college I could possibly want to attend and that I won't feel like I am screwed over if I go there. And that might be willing to take a chance on a student from a rural area with a relatively unremarkable extracurricular record. As far as I can make out, people in the debate world tend to aim as high as possible. However, even with near-perfect grades and a 1500 on the SAT, I might feel forced to attend Tulane, simply because I didn't compete at Nats or the ToC. I also blew my opportunity to fly into the town's radar... Daisy, with a heavy heart, goes to see Paige's father and watch him judge the double-octos game between... Grant and another player she never heard of. The winner of that game will play at Nats.
"Paige, you dragged me here so that I can watch your nerd friend debate carbon pricing!" Paige's boyfriend, an offensive tackle, scolds her. "I did this for you, and also out of loyalty for VA. Now, if you may excuse me, I must go study for the finals"
"I guess, I have no choice" Albert then goes out of the campus to study with the offensive tackle, along with Albert's love interest of the day, a senior.
Yet, even when Grant ends up losing that game, she realizes that the player she lost against himself being shut out of Nats is of little comfort to her. Nor would having beaten players already at Nats or the ToC in other tournaments earlier this season have provided much comfort either. After the round ends, and hence the tourney, Paige's father unpacks his experience of judging Last Chance in front of Daisy and Paige:
"Thank God Last Chance is a traditional LD tournament. If you asked me to judge LD at Isidore Newman, Columbia or Stanford, I would probably stick to novice LD. Then again, as do several substitute teachers, I go in to judge debate rounds for extra work hours and hence salary" Paige's father explains to them.
"Surely other drivers drive buses for field trips or sports games for extra work hours!" Daisy points out.
"Other bus drivers prefer to chauffeur sports teams, but often driving the debate team around means I must spend weekends away from home!"
The following Monday, Daisy is invited to deliver the morning announcement and then everyone at school will know about how Last Chance went. Because the attention of the student body is on the ToC, with Chantal being the "must-watch" player in extemp there.
"While the star players of the debate team are away at the Tournament of Champions in Lexington, I stayed home to compete at the Last Chance qualifier. And I made it to triple-octos in Lincoln-Douglas at Last Chance" Daisy's face is noticeably down as she exits the principal's office.
That's even worse than Florence... The one saving grace for Flo was that she was called in to reinforce the quiz bowl team senior year. What will Daisy's be? It could have gone either way, but even if she won in triple-octos, there are moving parts in double-octos, the same as in any other debate round, the disappointment of the principal starts showing as soon as the announcement ends, even though the principal attended that very game. She let VA down as well as the town.
At lunch, however, the principal eats lunch with the teachers, who followed the VAs at the Tournament of Champions. Of course they pin their hopes on Chantal, who, by now, is the parish's golden girl. And, to the eyes of the VA community, she goes into the ToC as one of the overwhelming favorites by virtue of having swept the three premier online extemp tournaments: Duke, Columbia and Stanford.
"I hoped for better from Daisy. She played her best Lincoln-Douglas on Saturday, she clearly was of a sufficient caliber to compete at Nats!" the principal sighs.
"I kept quiet on Saturday, but it was the first time I ever watched a Lincoln-Douglas round. I would love to see an actor or two in a Congressional session some day. Also, I heard a variety of things about debaters: nerds with social skills, theater actors with either brains or political aspirations being the main ones!" the theater teacher responds to the principal.
Daisy certainly fits the second of the three bills. I was willing to cut her some slack on stage because of her debate commitments, but now I feel like she let me down. Yet, all she ever told me about debating was how it interfered with theater rehearsals, and, of course, the state championship, the theater teacher ruminates while eating.
"And I feel like Daisy is mostly going through the motions. Now I wonder who's the bigger disappointment, Flo or Daisy. They both feel so similar, and yet, they attended VA in vastly different contexts. Back in Flo's day, the debate team flew under the town's radar, but she was the one who made the team decent back then. And it was waiting for its big break, which came two years after Flo graduated. Daisy, on the other hand, is overshadowed mostly by Chantal on the debate floor, playing on a team locked in a three-way battle for the town's spotlight" Steven, the guidance counselor, explains.
Flo just took the cheapest way to get to where she wants. Daisy might prove different, and students at her level can essentially consider anything short of an Ivy fair game, so long as they can afford to attend, Steven can't help but think of past students at Daisy's level. My guess is that Daisy could consider any college at Tulane's tier worth attending, much like some of her opponents at her academic level. And honestly, I hope she's OK with not attending an elite college...
"Pray that our own make it deep into the ToC" Kent, a middle school social studies teacher, makes his prayers for Chantal since she's the only VA left and the results of the extemp final aren't announced yet.
"Speaking of the ToC, I wonder why is it that Daisy didn't apply for an at-large entry..." a substitute teacher who judged Congressional sessions at Stanford sighs.
"I have no clue of what an at-large entry even is..." the theater teacher rolls their eyes upon hearing about at-large entries at the ToC.
Yet, based on historical trends for at-large ToC entries in LD, Daisy could realistically have competed at the ToC, but man would it have cost the parish if she made it. However, VA is still, at its core, a mostly traditional LD debate program, and the ToC is for progressive LD.
Nevertheless, just competing at the ToC is a remarkable feat for a Title I school such as VA, so the policy pair coming within one round of the elims, or the PF pair getting to octos in the gold division, is already a lot.