The Dos Pueblos High School Mock Trial team traveled to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania to compete in the Empire Mock Trial Philadelphia Classic. The team won the final round where they competed against Lynbrook High School from San Jose, California.

The team had been preparing since they initially received the case in mid-July, which included practices twice a week as well as hours put into preparations outside of practice.

“There was a lot of preparation,” Ethan Gardiner (10) said. “We had three or four scrimmages against other teams to … work out what was working well in our case and what wasn’t working. And then, we had six hours of practice every week, plus lots of hours outside of practice; memorizing and redrafting stuff.”

While prepared, one of the team captains, Sofia Elena Lara (12), felt “a little bit nervous” going into the competition.

“I think surrounding DP Mock, we have a reputation for doing really, really well in competitions,” Lara said. “The last 20 years, we’ve gone to Empire, we’ve always placed top four. So, there’s definitely that kind of pressure.”

William Parisse (12), another team captain, felt that making it to the final round was “exhilarating.”

“Winning the actual championship round, that was just like an incredible feeling,” Parisse said. “Like, hugging my teammates, it was awesome.”