ELITE: UGA Becomes Only Student-Coached Program in Nation with 4 Bids to Nationals

3.1.10 After receiving two more bids to Nationals at this weekend's Birmingham Regional, UGA Mock Trial became the only student-coached program in the United States to earn four bids to Nationals.

Last year, the only student-coached Mock Trial program to achieve that feat was Harvard University, who was unable to qualify four teams this year.

Teams qualify for Nationals by finishing in the top-8 at a Regional tournament. UGA's A Teams placed 4th and 8th at the Birmingham Regional, while its B Teams placed 4th and 8th at the Chapel Hill Regional.

The program's A Teams will represent UGA Mock Trial at the Greenville, SC Opening Round Championship Site (ORCS) of Nationals at the end of March to attempt to earn bids to the National Championship Tournament.

Only seven programs in the country qualified four teams for Nationals this year. UGA and Furman University are the only Southern teams among those.

Other than UGA, all of the programs qualifying four teams for Nationals make use of law students, attorneys, or faculty members, who serve as coaches. UGA is the only one of those seven programs that is coached entirely by undergraduates.

Perennial powerhouses NYU and Duke, as well as numerous other programs, were unable to qualify all of their Regionals teams for Nationals this year, as was five-time National champion University of Maryland - College Park.

Programs qualifying four teams for Nationals this year were the University of Chicago, Furman University, Miami University (Ohio), Northwestern University, University of California - Irvine, and UCLA.

Share on Facebook