OXFORD, Miss. – The Mississippi Sports Law Review, a student organization of the University of Mississippi School of Law, is hosting a spring symposium next week on “The Bowl Championship Series and Conference Realignment.”
The event is slated for 1-2:30 p.m. March 2 in the Robert C. Khayat Law Center, Room 1078. The event is free and open to the public, particularly anyone with interest in sports and law. Free continuing legal education credit is available for all attorneys who attend.
The symposium will explore legal issues related to the Bowl Championship Series, assess the likelihood of a college football playoff and discuss the role of litigation and public action in promoting a move from the current system to a college football playoff. It also will address conference realignment and expansion issues, which have been driven by the desire of universities to gain or protect their position in a BCS conference.
“Our goal is to demonstrate the importance of law and its impact on the sports community,” said Justin Campbell, editor-in-chief of the Mississippi Sports Law Review. “We want to discuss legal issues like breach of contract and exit fee litigation and the renegotiation of media deals, which are worth millions of dollars to the individual schools and billions of dollars to the conference.”
The event will be moderated by William Berry, UM professor of law. Speakers will include Christian Dennie, attorney with Barlow, Garsek, & Simon of Fort Worth, Texas; Alfred Mathewson, Henry Weihofen chair in law at the University of New Mexico; and Rodney Smith, director of the Center for Sports Law and Policy at Thomas Jefferson School of Law in San Diego. Each will present a paper on the issue of the symposium, followed by a question-and-answer time.
“We are excited about the quality of our panelists, all of whom are well-regarded in the field of sports law and bring a diversity of experiences,” Berry said.
“The sports sector continually deals with issues of labor and employment law, contract law, trademark and intellectual property law, and tort law, just to name a few,” Campbell said. “We hope those who attend will leave understanding the significance of sports law at a deeper level than they normally get from ESPN, and that there is much more to sports law than just being an agent.”
The Mississippi Sports Law Review began in the spring of 2011. It produces two issues annually – winter and spring – which are available in print and online. The content of the Review is available at http://www.mssportslaw.olemiss.edu. The publication aims to make the law school the premier source for up-to-date and relevant scholarship in the sports law field.
For more information, contact Jenny Kate Luster at 662-915-3424. Click here for more information on programs at the UM School of Law.