Press Contact:
Event Contact: Janice Yahola, Board of Advocates, 512-232-3680
Press Contact: Laura Castro, UT Law Communications 512-232-1229
The nation's premier mock trial competition invites the public to view final round
AUSTIN, Texas — The Board of Advocates at the University of Texas School of Law will host this year's Tournament of Champions, the nation's most prestigious mock trial competition for law students, on Oct. 30-Nov. 2. It is the first time the Law School - winner of the Tournament of Champions in 2000 -will host the competition that it will also participate in.
“It's important for students to compete on a national level,” said Professor Tracy McCormack, director of UT Law’s advocacy programs. “It's also a great opportunity for law firms and judges to see not only the talent that UT has developed, but some of the top student advocates across the country,” she said. Hosting the invitation-only competition reflects the strength of UT Law’s trial advocacy program, which ranks seventh in the nation, McCormack added.
The National Institute for Trial Advocacy (NITA), widely regarded as the best trial lawyer-training program in the country, sponsors the competition. Each year the law schools with the best records in their districts over the past three years in the TYLA National Trial Competition and ATLA Student Trial Advocacy Competition are invited to participate in the Tournament of Champions. The law school to win the tournament becomes the host of the competition two years later.
Sixteen teams will compete in the first four rounds of the competition at the Law School on Thursday and Friday, Oct. 31-Nov. 1. On Saturday, Nov. 2, the semi-finals and the finals will be held. The Law School community and the public are invited to watch the final round in the Jeffers Courtroom at 2 p.m. on Saturday.
This year's competitors are Alabama, Baylor, Buffalo, Drake, Florida, Howard, Kentucky, Loyola - Los Angeles, Northwestern, Notre Dame, Pepperdine, Samford - Cumberland, Stetson, Temple, Texas, and Wake Forest University. The teams will argue a civil negligence case.
The team from UT Law includes Erin Anderson, Daniel Bradford, Daniel Knight, Craig Moore, and Naomi Porterfield. Coaching the team will be local trial attorney Stephen W. Harris of The Harris Firm. Harris, a 1984 UT Law graduate, coached UT to first-place at the Tournament of Champions in 2000 and second-place in the competition last year, losing by only one point.
The team's assistant coach is Mark Santos, a 2002 graduate of UT Law, who as a team member and chair of the BOA helped bring UT to a successful second-place finish last year. Santos currently works in the Prosecutor Assistants Division of the Texas Attorney General's Office in Austin and will begin active duty service in the U.S. Army as a JAG officer in January.
For more information about the competition, including schedule of events, go
to http://www.utexas.edu/law/academics/advocacy/boa/.
If you are an attorney interested in acting as a judge for the Tournament of
Champions, please contact Cheryl Brandt, Trial Advocacy Program Associate Director,
at cbrandt@mail.law.utexas.edu
or 512-232-1257. Or contact Janice Yahola, Coordinator, Board of Advocates,
at 512-232-3680.