Hunter Haunting 2026
2026 — West Valley, UT/US
Tournament Invite & Schedule
Hunter Haunting Sat. Oct. 24th
Hunter High School
4200 south 5600 West, West Valley, Utah 84120
Dear Coaches:
Please join us for Hunter Haunting this year to be held in person with select events available online asynchronously. Pertinent details are listed below, but please feel free to contact me for any additional information. We hope to see you on Saturday October 24th!
Costumes are encouraged and may be worn if they in no way contribute to or are utilized to enhance an interpretive event. We will also have a costume contest(enter as an individual or a group) with the winners being recognized during the awards ceremony. The tournament will be done by 6:00 (fingers crossed) so attending the tournament will not impact any Halloween related or other evening events for students.
In addition to our in-person events, Informative, Oratory, Combined Interp, Newscaster, and Declamation will be available as asynchronous events. Additionally, we’ll have three special Halloween themed asynchronous events, Spinetingling Storytelling, Petrifying Poetry, and Lethal Lip Synch. All Spar and Impromptu topics will also be Halloween themed! The deadline for asynchronous event submissions is Thursday Oct. 22nd by 9:00 PM. Please double, triple, quadruple or even quintuple enter! Students may enter multiple events both online and in person and, in fact, are encouraged to do so! Earn those points! However, only one of those events can be a debate. Also, students cannot double enter in Policy Debate and Extemp or Congress and Extemp (any other non-debate event is fine). As always, students enter multiple events at their own risk. Events will be collapsed as needed based on the number of entries.
Concessions will be available, and we encourage you to take advantage of it! This year, we'll be brining back the popular dirty sodas and iced coffee bar! We’ll have grab and go options for breakfast (pastries, granola bars, etc.) For lunch we will have pizza. Snacks, candy, drinks, and such will be available for purchase throughout the day. Returning this year will be debate themed buttons for sale. We can accept cash or card, touch pay, apple pay, google pay, etc. Free food and drinks will be provided for judges and coaches in the library.
Checks should be made out to Hunter High School Debate and mailed to:
HUNTER HIGH SCHOOL
ATTENTION: KHRISTIAN OWENS
4200 South 5600 West
West Valley, Utah 84120
Deadlines
The deadline to enter is Wednesday Oct. 21st by 5:00 PM. Nuisance fines start Thursday Oct. 22nd at 5:00 PM. You can drop entries online until Friday Oct. 23rd by 5:00 PM. Judges due by Thursday Oct. 22nd by 5:00 PM. The deadline for asynchronous event submissions is Thursday Oct. 22nd by 9:00 PM.
Judges
Please have your judges create a Tabroom account and link them to your team. Make sure they are familiar with how to use Tabroom and judge their event category - please reference the UDCA Event Rubrics available on the UDCA webpage. Also, consider encouraging your judges to take the judging courses now available on the NSDA website https://www.speechanddebate.org/learn/judge-accreditation/ to ensure they are well prepared and have a positive judging experience.
TOPICS AND LEGISLATION:
All Spar and Impromptu Topics will be Halloween themed!
Novice LD will be using the Sept./Oct. Varsity topic – Resolved: Outer space colonization is a moral obligation.
Varsity LD will also be using the Sept./Oct. topic – Resolved: Resolved: Outer space colonization is a moral obligation.
PF will be using the Sept./Oct. topic - Resolved: The United States Federal Government should enact a moratorium on hyperscale data center construction.
Policy will be using this year’s topic - Resolved: The United States Federal Government should establish national health insurance in the United States. Novice Policy will be expected to keep to the Novice Packet case and evidence limits for Utah including no use of the Novice Packet kritik.
Big Question will be using the topic - Resolved: Technological progress has surpassed humanities' ability to use it ethically.
Extemp topics: The topics used for this tournament will be based on September/October NFHS and NSDA questions.
Congress legislation: A list of congress legislation by session will be posted on Tabroom by Oct 1stalong with the UDCA Orders of the Day. Legislation for September/October can also be found on the UDCA website https://utahdebatecoaches.org/congress-legislation/
DEBATE EVENTS OFFERED:
Novice & Open Lincoln Douglas
Novice & Open Public Forum
Novice & Open Congress
Novice & Open Policy
Open Big Question (Please enter as it's an additional fundraiser for us, thanks!)
SPEECH/INTERP EVENTS OFFERED:
Novice & Open Impromptu
Novice & Open Extemp (Combined National & Foreign)
Novice & Open Oratory
Novice & Open Informative
Novice & Open Duo
Novice & Open Combined Interp (we'll happily separate events if we get enough entries.)
Open SPAR
EVENTS ASYNCHRONOUSLY ONLINE:
Open Informative
Open Oratory
Open Combined Interp (HI/DI/POI)
Open Duo
Open Newscaster
Open Declamation
Open Spinetingling Storytelling
Open Petrifying Poetry
Open Lethal Lip Synch
TOURNAMENT SCHEDULE
SATURDAY, OCTOBER 24TH
7:15 Judges Meeting/training in Library
8-10 Debate/Congress/BQ
9:30 Extemp Draw in Cafeteria
10-11 Speech
11-1 Debate/Congress/BQ
12:30 Extemp Draw in Cafeteria
1-2 Speech
2-4 Debate/Congress/BQ
3:30 Extemp Draw in Cafeteria
4-5 Speech
5:30 awards/ Costume Contest
Happy Haunting!
Khristian Owens & Elliot Hurd
Hunter High Speech & Debate