Transactional Sports & Corporate Law

Every deal starts as a legal question.

I'm a 1L at Loyola Law School and a USC Legal Studies alumnus, magna cum laude. My interest is the deal side — contracts, licensing, IP strategy, and the regulation that decides what an agreement can look like before anyone reaches the table.

Start a conversation Resume (PDF)

Or reach me directly at nathan.castillo@lls.edu

Nathan Castillo in a dark suit, photographed in a campus colonnade
Loyola Law SchoolJ.D. Candidate '29
USCB.S. Legal Studies '26 · Magna Cum Laude · 3.74
LA Superior CourtJudicial Intern
LA County D.A.Volunteer Student Worker
California Property Law GroupOffice Manager

Focus

Where I'm building

My USC capstone examined regulatory instability in college athletics — NIL rights, the transfer portal, and the case for federal oversight. Writing it clarified something I keep returning to: the legal framework decides what deals are possible long before anyone starts negotiating.

01

Sports & Entertainment

Athlete and talent representation, endorsement structures, and the deal mechanics behind media and live events.

02

Corporate & M&A

Transaction structure, diligence, and the agreements that allocate risk between parties who need each other.

03

Licensing & IP

Rights strategy across fast-moving industries — who owns what, for how long, and on which terms.

04

NIL & Regulation

College athletics policy, the transfer portal, and the federal oversight question that reshapes the market underneath it.

Nathan Castillo in USC regalia at the Tommy Trojan statue
I transferred in from community college, graduated magna cum laude, and put 450 hours into hunger relief across LA County. I intend to close deals for a living and still be useful to the neighborhoods I came from.
USC Class of 2026

Experience

Before law school

As Office Manager at California Property Law Group, a boutique litigation firm, I ran daily operations for a high-volume practice — coordinating court coverage for five attorneys and managing filings and post-judgment enforcement end to end. Before that, I interned at the Los Angeles Superior Court under Judge Shelly Torrealba and served at the LA County District Attorney's Office. Together they gave me a working view of how a case actually moves, long before the casebook version.

Nathan Castillo in USC regalia on campus

Background

The long way around

I started at Glendale Community College and transferred to USC, where I graduated magna cum laude with Dean's List honors every semester. Along the way I served as Director of Internal Outreach for Latino Students in Law and as an Associate Editor for the USC Journal of Law and Society. In both roles, expanding access to the profession wasn't a side project — it was the point.

Internships at the Los Angeles Superior Court and the District Attorney's Office gave me a working view of how the system runs day to day. Outside of that, 450 hours with California College Corps distributing food to families across LA County — and, now, volunteering with Children's Hospital Los Angeles — shape how I think about who the law is actually for.

At Loyola I'm a member of the Entertainment & Sports Law Society and the Latinx Law Students Association, carrying forward the access-to-the-profession work I led as Director of Internal Outreach for Latino Students in Law at USC.

I read and speak Spanish conversationally. Outside of class: Dodgers and Lakers, collecting vinyl, and biographical films.

Recognition

Honors

Connect

What I'm looking for

I'm in my 1L year at Loyola, concentrating in entertainment and media law. The most useful thing anyone can offer is twenty minutes — how a transactional group actually staffs juniors, what a first-year deal associate's week looks like, what you wish you'd known before OCI.

Those conversations have shaped how I'm planning the next three years. If any of the areas below sit in your world, I'd like to hear from you.

Email me LinkedIn

nathan.castillo@lls.edu

  • Practice AreasSports and entertainment transactions · corporate and M&A · licensing and IP · NIL and college athletics regulation
  • Timing1L summer 2027 · 2L summer 2028 · open to conversations now
  • Based InLos Angeles — available in person across the county
  • Also UsefulReferrals, panel and speaker introductions, and anything aimed at first-generation and Latino students entering the profession