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Not One, But Two

Scotties Bring Home Two State Champs From Bigfork

Sweet Perfection!

Griffin Claims State Title With Perfect Season

Isabelle Griffin was not going to do speech and drama this year. After two silver medals at state her freshman and sophomore years, she was ranked fourth at state her junior year after losing a chance at a perfect season that same year in Sidney. Those losses made her think maybe pursuing a perfect season her senior year was not worth it. "This year I did not want to be in speech and drama," recounted the now state champ. That thought would pass, though, and Griffin would sign up for speech and drama and head into her senior season with the same strive for perfection she had held herself to every year prior, albeit her last minute decision would leave her a little unprepared for her first meet.

In fact, Griffin says, she did not settle on a piece until a couple of weeks prior to the first meet and, even then, she only memorized the piece two days before the actual meet. Her first time performing it all the way through was at that same meet.

She went on to describe an agonizing search for a performance piece that left her settling on "The Good Mother," which she says she hated when she first picked it up and thought she would eventually find a piece she loved before the season ended and switch it up. That switch never came though, as Griffin continued performing the dramatic solo. It grew on her until she had decided to carry it through to state and it earned her the long-sought state championship she had strived for since her first year in the activity.

"This is the first year I haven't loved my piece at the start and hated it at the end," said Griffin. "Instead I hated it and then grew to love it."

When asked if that love of the piece had helped her win state, she replied, "I think I won state because I performed well." She said that the realization that this year was her last opportunity to win a state title in speech and drama drove her to pull out her best performances to date and carry it through to the end.

"When we got to Bigfork, I was touring the school before everything started," recalled Griffin. "I came to a room and realized that it was the room I won my first divisional title in as a freshman. I started bawling in the hallway at Bigfork." As a freshman, Griffin had competed in Sunburst, Mont. She has claimed a divisional champion title every year of her high school career. Her junior year she moved to Glasgow and came out swinging with a near perfect season (save for a sixth place finish in Sidney that she says happened for "no good reason"), but she would go on to get her lowest state performance with a fourth place finish. That was also the first year she finished any meet below third place, let alone twice in the same year.

Discussing the state meet in Bigfork Griffin said, "I think it was the best meet I've had-ever." She said that despite awkward scoring from the judges, a power outage that lasted into the final rounds of the meet and receiving the lowest points she had ever been scored in any meet in her final round, she still managed to pull out a first place finish. Griffin said that for someone who almost always gets the best score possible in a competition, the low score in the finals kind of shocked her. "So, it was frustrating seeing what I ended with in the finals."

As state champ for serious oral interpretation, Ian Wright, would add in his interview, "It's all on the judges." Then Griffin interjected quickly, "And the judges were terrible."

Scottie Speech and Drama coach Jody Griffin said that, unfortunately, the lack of training for judges and the last minute volunteers for meets makes it difficult for the kids. She pointed out instances where judges had made comments that were not constructive or judged competitors on pieces based on content and not presentation-a move that is not supposed to happen, but does. She said that often a meet, like the one held in Glasgow each year, can require a hundred judges but only three or four will show up for the training. The lack of consistency amongst the judges makes it difficult for the competitors to anticipate consistency.

That factor was not enough to slow Griffin down, though, as she finished every meet this year in first place and nearly claimed first in every single round of competition. Wright had a similar performance but fell short of a perfect season while competing in Poplar while seriously ill. With that performance aside, he carried an impressive record of top place finishes that show that pure skill can overcome poor judges.

Discussing her perfect season, Griffin said, "Oh man, I did not think it was going to happen." She recalled the number of reasons why she had lost a perfect season in the past and even losing state three years prior. There was also that point at which she did not want to even continue in the activity at all.

Next week Griffin heads to Missoula to audition for a performing arts scholarship. She says that theatre was never a part of the plan and that in seventh grade she had intended to pursue a woodwind music degree at an out-of-state college, and she still wants to study music at the University of Montana, but she added that if the auditions work out she is not opposed to switching her desired major around. Her mother, coach Griffin, is urging her to take some time in New York, where her older sister lives, and audition for some live theatre opportunities on or off Broadway.

Thinking I knew the answer, I asked Griffin what her favorite part of the season had been, she looked at me straight-faced and said, "My favorite part of the season was sitting on the side of the road for four hours outside Saco because the bus had broken down," then she laughed and said, "No seriously, best part."

Griffin and Wright are the first state champions in speech and debate for the Glasgow Scotties since Sydney Hayward won in 2011.

Still a Year to Go

Wright Claims State Title, Looks to "Defend" it in a Year

Scottie junior Ian Wright is a rather soft-spoken high schooler, but that side of his personality disappears when he gets up to perform. The difference is so striking that one judge criticized one of his rounds at the state meet in Bigfork on Feb. 1 by saying he had, "Too much intensity." That split personality was no accident, though, since Wright's serious oral interpretation piece focuses on the story of an adolescent kid suffering from schizophrenia for the first time. The competing voices of a scared child and a nearly demonic inner-voice present an interesting challenge and contrast for Wright's performances that are seamlessly coupled with that "intensity" the judge was writing about.

Regardless of the critique though, Wright managed to pull off a state title performance in Bigfork and finished off his junior year with only one second place finish to accompany all of the other first place finishes-a near perfect season. It was quite the finish for the junior Scottie who has every intention of a repeat performance next year.

"It went great," said Wright. "[State] was the best I've ever performed any piece and that's the time to do it." Wright said the competition was stiff and his perception leaving finals was that all of the competitors were really good. So, until his name was called at the awards ceremony on Feb. 1, he was still unsure whether he would win it or not.

But now that he has won the title, Wright says, "It is kind of stressful because I've got to defend my title next year." Wright is looking forward to next season, but said it will be a difficult transition, since the team is losing seven seniors and is short on current juniors. He says it will be difficult to be one of the few talking to the younger classes about their rounds and hyping up the participants for their competitions.

Wright explained that he feels that competing in speech and drama is easier when you have those upper-class competitors "who have done it for years" helping out the younger ones. He looks forward to continuing that tradition next year and being a guiding hand for his teammates and a helping hand for the coaches.

"The program is growing," said Wright, "and the program is getting better and hopefully it will be up there with basketball and football in the community. At least way more than last year."

Scottie head coach Jody Griffin said that Wright, and his fellow state champion Isabelle Griffin, are "naturals" in the performing realm and need almost no coaching. Because of their skills in competition, she explained that they barely need to run through their performances at practice and instead spend a lot of time mentoring their fellow teammates, a skill that lends a lot of support to the coaching staff who are not usually able to see competitions since the coaches are usually responsible for assisting with scoring and managing meets.

Wright recalled selecting his piece about schizophrenia saying it was easy enough to find. He turned to a website that has prepared a number of performances for this exact reason. "I got my piece there," recalled Wright. "It was hidden under a dumb title." After finding it, he performed it at a 15-minute run time and had to cut it down to just under 10 minutes. Wright said that he had really taken it down to the bare minimum it could go without losing too much of the original context of the performance. As the season went on, he managed to memorize every line and he added in more dramatic movements and expressions until the piece had evolved throughout the season into the one that would win him State. It was a nail biter for time, though, as his state final clock was one second away from being docked for length at nine minutes and 59 seconds.

Coach Griffin said that Wright's preparation, performance skills and consistency make coaching him rather easy, all things considered. "You don't need to coach Ian [Wright]," she explained. "He puts so much thought and time into it already."

 

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