Both teams place top-five at Richmond, take 1 and 2 spots at GAMTI
November 10, 2006 - Six months after winning its first Collegiate Mock Trial National Championship, the Virginia Mock Trial program began the 2006-2007 with several early season successes. The program's two split-stacked teams took the number 2 and number 4 spots at the University of Richmond Invitational in late October. Just two weeks later,
Mock Trial at UVa achieved an astonishing 16-0 program record as its two teams went undefeated to take first and second place at GAMTI 2006. It was the third year in a row that a
Mock Trial at UVa team has won the D.C. tournament.
This was the first year that UVa has attended the Richmond Invitational. After four rounds of competition, team 972 boasted a 7-1-0 record � having sustained its single lost by a one point margin. Overall, team 972 earned a point differential of +101, averaging more than +14 margins on each of its seven victories. Team 972 achieved a 6-2 record, racking up its own substantial point differential of +75.
Returning member Cary Mayberger won her first Outstanding Witness award with 18 ranks.
Coming off its double top-five finish,
Mock Trial at UVa returned in early November to the E. Barrett Prettyman federal courthouse in Washington, D.C., where UVa had twice previously won the Great American Mock Trial Invitational. In the program�s most successful invitational weekend to date, both team 972 and team 973 went undefeated, winning first and second place with point differentials of +80 and +76, respectively. This marks the third tournament where a Virginia squad has gone undefeated in the past three seasons. Virginia had previously achieved 8-0-0 records at GAMTI 2004 and at the 2005 Quaker Classic Invitational in Philadelphia.
Equally as impressive, Virginia racked up six individual awards at GAMTI. Award winners include Ryann Burke, both as a witness (19 ranks) and attorney (16 ranks); Jamar Walker (witness, 16 ranks); Daniel Young (attorney, 20 ranks) and new members Lucy Partain (attorney, 17 ranks) and Juliana Yee (witness, 16 ranks).
Ryann Burke's awards mark the first time in program history that a competitor has won an outstanding attorney and an outstanding witness award at a single competition.
With teams now stacked, Virginia looks forward to the rest of its first invitational season as Defending National Champions. Soon team 972 will head to Rhodes College for the Blues City Challenge, while team 973 will compete for the first time at the Tobacco Road Invitational hosted by Duke and UNC. smrtovnice