Four Texas A&M graduate students from the Department of Health and Kinesiology and the Department of Marketing won first place in the National Sport Forum (NSF) Case Cup Competition held in Memphis.

The NSF Case Cup Competition is a unique opportunity for Sports MBA students from seven invited institutions to compete in a multidisciplinary case study utilizing the skills obtained in their Sports MBA curricula.

This year, Khalid Ballouli (team captain, M.S. in sport management student and former Texas A&M baseball player), Lisa Gorscky (M.S. in sport management student and former Texas A&M softball player), Blaine Gwinn (M.S. in marketing student and A&M rodeo), and Bonner Cooper (M.S. in marketing student and A&M rodeo, pro rodeo athlete) competed against MBA students from Arizona State University, University of Memphis, Ohio University, University of Oregon, San Diego State University, and the University of Central Florida.

After receiving their case, the teams had exactly 24 hours to study and prepare a 20 minute presentation of their conclusions. During the 24 hours, Aggie team was not allowed to contact their faculty advisor, Gregg Bennett, assistant professor, sport management. The teams presented their case to a panel of six sport industry professionals and topical experts and were judged based on the quality and content of their case response, overall presentation ability, and strength of their responses in the question and answer period.

Only one winning team was selected. The team from Texas A&M was recognized in front of the entire NSF conference, which is considered the nation's largest annual cross gathering of the top team sports marketing, sales, promotions, and event entertainment executives from throughout the broad spectrum of teams and leagues in North America.

"We are extremely proud of our team and their performance in the case study competition," said Bennett. "They represented A&M and the Center for Sport Management Research and Education very well. The accomplishment is no small feat since they were competing against MBA students from well respected sport business programs."