Benedictine College’s St. Scholastica Hall hosted an Alcohol Free Event (AFE) on Feb. 9 at 8:30p.m., where twelve Benedictine College men competed for the title of Mr. Benedictine College 2026.
The event was led by junior hosts Ella Stroeing, an education major, and Jessica Mannella, a biology major.
Guest judges for the event included Dr. Angela Broaddus, a professor in the Mathematics and Computer Science Department, Seth Conrad, the Residence Director for Courtney S. Turner Hall and Kary Newbolds, the student administrative assistant.
Like all AFE’s, short commercials were shown throughout the night to encourage healthy alcohol use. Each residence hall hosts an AFE as a way to build community and provide students an alternative weekend activity.
The competition contained three rounds, with contestants eliminated after each round.
The 12 contestants were introduced:
- Charlie Rzhia, freshman
- Anthony Cortijo Roman, freshman
- Tam Nguyen, freshman
- Jacob Volpe, sophomore
- Christopher LaRocque, sophomore
- Joseph Vyvlecka, sophomore
- Paddy Olsen, junior
- Edward Stephenson, junior
- Ethan Wagner, junior
- John Paul Doyle, senior
- Gabe Jones, senior
- Jack Schoening, senior
The first round was based on talent. Volpe opened the competition with improvised choreography to “Fear” by NF, a song chosen at random by the audience.
Shoening followed with a sequence of animal impressions, performing not just noises, but full physical acting. He crawled, slithered and bounced across the stage, explaining each animal as he acted it out.
Doyle was next, arranging two bouquets of flowers while telling the story about how he met his fiancée. He joked about making an extra bouquet to bribe the judges. Once he finished, he handed one of the bouquets to the judges and ran off the stage to deliver the other to his fiance, who was in the crowd.
Cortijo Roman performed a traditional Puerto Rican dance. Vyvlecka carefully crafted a balloon dog. Olsen sang Frederick Loewe and Alan Jay Lerner’s “On the Street Where You Live”. Rzhia executed a ventriloquism act.
Jones presented a powerpoint on his “special talent”. He claimed he could compare people to cartoon characters with accuracy. One example featured Dr. Mulholland, chair of the Classics department, who Jones compared to Carl Fredricksen, the protagonist of Disney’s “Up”.
LaRocque bounced a golf ball on a golf club repeatedly, while Stephenson played the bagpipes. Nguyen attempted to flip a water bottle upright, but was unsuccessful.
Wagner closed the round with a DJ set. As he mixed songs, all the contestants ran on stage to dance. The audience, infected by the energy, joined in, jumping and waving their phone flashlights in the air. It was electric.
At the end of the round, Vyvlecka, LaRocque and Nguyen were eliminated.
The second round challenged the remaining contestants to create a hand drawn portrait of one of the residents at St Scholastica Hall in three minutes. As the men struggled to get through the challenge, a camera broadcasted their drawings onto a projector screen for the audience to see.
“Edward, I’m so sorry, but please stick to Mechanical Engineering”, Stroeing joked as Stephenson’s portrait appeared on the screen.
Moving on to the final round were Schoening, Rzhia and Jones.
The final contest was a round of Mr. Hot Seat, where the goal is to answer as many rapid-fire questions as possible. The questions ranged from “What are your thoughts on Amelia Earhart?” to “What is the first thing you do in the morning?”
One of the questions asked what each contestant would buy with $100.
“Something for my mom,” Schoening said.
“100 slinky dinks,” Jones replied.
“A car for my brother,” Rzhia answered.
After the round was over, last year’s winner of Mr. BC 2025, Tim Kasprzak, walked onto the stage to pass on the crown to the next winner.
The audience slapped their hands on their knees to create a drumroll as the winners were announced.
Schoening placed third, Rzhia took second and the title of Mr. BC 2026 went to Jones.
