Third-year student Sydney Weiskopf and second-year student Madison Riggins recently won first place in the College Athletics Infractions Hearing Competition. The competition, hosted by University of Iowa Colleges of Law and Liberal Arts and Sciences, took place Feb. 24 and 25 via Zoom. The team was coached by Joshua Lens, assistant professor at the U of A, former attorney and college athletics administrator.

"Both Sydney and Madison had taken my class in the fall on NCAA governance, legislation and compliance, so they decided early on that they would differentiate themselves by being able to cite, discuss and use precedent, and multiple judges told me later that their use of precedent really stood out as impactful," Lens said.

Weiskopf and Riggins competed against 13 teams from across the country. The mock case involved alleged misuse of NIL to commit recruiting violations, and teams had the opportunity to argue as both the hypothetical university and as the NCAA enforcement staff. Participants argued their case before 18 college athletics executives and attorneys who volunteered to read and score student writing samples and judge hearings.

The College Athletics Infractions Hearing Competition is designed to closely simulate hearings of the NCAA Committee on Infractions by giving students roles as NCAA enforcement staff and university defense counsel. The competition is open to law students and grad students from various fields. Participating schools this year included University of Iowa, University of Illinois, Indiana University, Pepperdine University, U of A, Creighton University, University of Houston, Brooklyn Law School and New England School of Law.