YLS Team Wins Regional Appellate Advocacy Competition

A team of Law School students — Nina Reddy ’25, Marco Romero ’25, and Joe Sullivan-Springhetti ’25 — won the Regional Championship in the National Appellate Advocacy Competition (NAAC) held by the ABA in Philadelphia last month. 

The NAAC is a moot court competition that emphasizes the development of oral advocacy skills through a realistic appellate advocacy experience. Competitors from law schools nationwide participate in a hypothetical appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court. The competition involves writing a brief as either the petitioner or respondent then arguing the case in front of the mock court. 

Potential topics can range from questions of statutory interpretation to constitutional issues — this year, the case concerned whether the Fourth Amendment allows a school district to subject its students to random sniffs by drug-detecting dogs. 

Romero had been on a moot court team as an undergraduate.

“I missed the camaraderie that comes with being on a team, so once I found out about the NAAC competition, I asked two of my closest friends if they’d be interested in forming a team, and to my delight they agreed,c he said. 

The competition was held in a federal courthouse for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania, which added to the intensity and realism of the competition. 

The regional competition is broken up into two stages: preliminary rounds and knockout rounds. For the prelims, a team wins or loses based on a mix of oral argument score (66%) and brief score (33%). For knockout rounds, teams advance purely on oral argument score, so the team that wins a majority of the judges’ votes moves on to the next round. 

One of the most enlightening and informative aspects of the competition was seeing how advocates with completely different styles can both be highly effective.”
—Marco Romero ’25

Romero and Sullivan-Springhetti competed in the oral advocacy portion and Reddy authored the team’s brief.

“Competition was grueling but incredibly fun,” Romero said. During the knockout rounds, competition was intense, especially in the final round against a team from Notre Dame. From an original field of 32 teams competing in Philadelphia, four move on to the nationals. 

As part of her role authoring the team’s brief, Reddy worked to compile the team’s input. 

“The collaborative writing process, particularly blending everyone’s writing into one voice, was challenging but rewarding,” she said.

During competition, Romero noticed how different approaches could be successful.

“One of the most enlightening and informative aspects of the competition was seeing how advocates with completely different styles can both be highly effective,” Romero said. “Even a small verbal misstep could cost you the round.” 

The competition helped demonstrate that there is not one correct style of good lawyering or being a strong advocate, according to Romero. 

“On more than one occasion the judges noted in feedback how different yet complimentary our styles were, and that just drove home the point that everyone has their own unique way of presenting a case, and there’s no rigid formula to being successful."

The team now moves on to the nationals in Chicago in April.