A Short History of Moot Court at CSULB

CSULB has a rich moot court history.  This has been true at both the national and regional level.

CSULB is one of seven schools to win a national moot court championship.  It did so in 2003 when CSULB juniors Tommy Hartnett and Ja’Nene Hall finished first at that year’s American Collegiate Moot Court Association (ACMA) tournament.  In the year’s since four additional CSULB teams have reached the elimination rounds.  These include Katelyn North and Anna Maria Banchero, and Katelyn North and Benjamin Koegel (who reached the round of sixteen in 2005 and 2006 respectively) and the hybrid teams of CSULB students Mason Taylor and Lindsay Nelson who along with teammates from Patrick Henry College (Anna Accomazo and Justin Jenkins) managed to reach the round of 32 in 2008.  All told, seven CSULB students have advanced to elimination rounds with Katelyn North doing so twice.  In addition, several CSULB students, including Hartnett, Jalyn Wang and Kirstin Brown have won individual oratory or written brief awards at the national tournament.

Starting in 2006-07, teams had to earn bids to the national championship through a series of automatic and at-large-bids CSULB senior Michalyn Thomas, paired in a hybrid team with Will Glaser (a junior from Patrick Henry College), became the first CSULB student in history to earn an automatic bid. Paige McCormack and Shelia Soroushian and Kristin Hallak and Jillian Martins became the first CSULB teams to earn an at-large-bids. CSULB’s three teams performed ably at the national event against stiff competition. A major highlight of which was meeting and having a photo taken with former Attorney General John Ashcroft. In addition, the team of Soroushian and McCormack fell just 7 points shy of tying the eventual national champions.

2007-2008 proved a better year at nationals for the CSULB squad.  The program again earned three bids to nationals.  Mason Taylor and Anna Accomazzo (a freshman from Patrick Henry College) earned an automatic bid while the teams of Paige McCormack (the only CSULB student to earn two bids to nationals) and Muhammad Ataya, Melissa Sanchez and Ted McNamara earned at-large-bids.  Traveling to Iowa in January, CSULB took along an alternate, senior Lindsay Nelson.  When fate (and the weather) kept two teams from attending the national tournament, Nelson teamed with Justin Jenkins (a junior from Patrick Henry College) to form a hybrid – CSULB’s fourth team.  The two hybrids survived to the elimination rounds with Taylor and Accomazzo missing a trip to the Sweet Sixteen by a mere two points.  The team of McCormack and Ataya just missed becoming CSULB’s third member of the round of 32.