BOWLING GREEN — The buzz for electronic sports, or esports, has amplified to a roar in the Mid-American Conference.
A dozen conference-affiliated schools in early June joined forces to establish the Esports Collegiate Conference (ESC), which is scheduled to begin competitive play independently from the MAC in the 2020-21 school year. Bowling Green State University and University of Toledo, which already had their own esports clubs established, are among the 12 involved, along with Akron, Ball State, Buffalo, Central Michigan, Eastern Michigan, Kent State, Miami, Northern Illinois, Ohio University, and Western Michigan.
“There’s boatloads of kids out there that want to do this — well, they’re doing it already,” MAC Commissioner Jon Steinbrecher said as the conference was announced. “And so to have some level of organization that provides for regular competitive opportunities that are well-run, on a regular basis, we think will give our schools a leg up in terms of attracting these students to their campuses.”
Esports and competitive gaming have been on the rise globally, and its peak is expected to continue to soar even through the coronavirus pandemic. The esports industry, according to data from Newzoo, is on track to gross approximately $1.1 billion in revenue globally in 2020. The figure is a 15.7 percent growth from its $950.6 million mark it reached in 2019. The majority of 2020 revenue — more than $822 million — is projected from advertising and media rights to broadcast esports gaming.
Competition has grown to the collegiate level, albeit not governed by the NCAA, with national tournaments being held for games of different genres. Overwatch, Counter Strike, League of Legends, Dota 2, Fortnite, Rocket League, Call of Duty, Minecraft, and Super Smash Bros. are widely popular games in the competitive scenes, and sports titles such as Madden NFL, NBA 2K, and FIFA are prevalent in a narrow community of crossover sports and video-game fanatics.
Bowling Green and Toledo’s esports clubs fielded more than 100 total competitors each as of the spring semester. Just as the esports industry has grown year-by-year, so have their clubs.
University of Toledo’s club has grown into classification as a club sport on campus, and the push has surfed along the same wave as the MAC’s conversations with starting the ESC.
The ESC’s establishment has been an idea talked about since as early as October, 2018.
“From a varsity component we’ve just basically been building from the ground up,” said Tony North, Jr., the Assistant Director of Programs and Leadership Development at UT. “We didn’t have a recognized varsity program, which the MAC has kind of pushed us towards.”
Similar vibes were felt at BGSU, where a niche environment grew to a team atmosphere.
“A lot of times, the students would get together and play Friday nights,” said Brian Heilmeier, the BGSU Associate Dean of Students for Campus Activities. “They would bring their equipment over to the student union. ... They were kind of doing their thing, and simultaneously the MAC reached out to all of its partner schools and said, ‘Hey, this is something we want to talk about.’”
Heilmeier will be “coaching” the esports team along with Ben Hammond, the desktop support supervisor for ITS at BGSU.
“For us, what they really meant was taking what the students had started and really finding ways to support them,” Heilmeyer said. “I think our goal here at Bowling Green was really to work with the students, figure out where there were some gaps, figure out we can support them a little bit better, and find out how we can continue to build that community.”
Bowling Green has invested in its esports program with a gaming lab complete with top-of-the-line equipment to keep the school as competitive as possible once the ESC gets going.
Hammond said the lab, which did a “soft opening” in February, is furnished with 21 Alienware Aurora R9 machines that operate on Intel i9700 processors and display on 144 hZ, 1080p Dell monitors. Each computer is equipped with an Invideo RTX 2060 graphics card, a solid-state hard drive, and HyperX Cloud 2 headphones. Alienware is a subsidiary of Dell, which is the school’s computer vendor.
The computers come with stock keyboards and mice, but gamers often bring their own equipment like that for competitive use. Each complete machine estimates at a $1,500-$1,800 value.
The lab also consists of five PlayStation 4 Pro systems for the school’s Call of Duty team, and the school has a few Xbox One controllers stashed away that are compatible with the machines if players prefer that over mouse and keyboard.
“We’re really trying to make the lab be accessible to almost any game,” Heilmeier said.
UT is actively planning to expand its facilities for esports competition. Currently students bring in their own equipment to use, but that doesn’t necessarily pit them at any significant competitive disadvantage.
“Our vision is to have various consoles that are available,” North, Jr., said. “We have a temporary space that we’re hoping to get into in the near future in our student union. ... It’s just a matter of getting the necessary things in there that we need to compete for the fall.”
The coronavirus pandemic locked the doors to BG’s shiny new lab and paused UT’s plans to expand upon theirs in March, but the possibility for the ESC to commence in the fall is still open.
BG’s computer lab has flexibility for social distancing so, once students are allowed back on campus and competition begins to flow consistently, some of the machines can be moved and removed to accommodate guidelines.
“Obviously, we’re waiting to hear on university policy and state guidelines as far as what we can and can’t do,” Heilmeier said. “The good thing about esports is they’re all online, so we’re not looking to travel. Even before the pandemic, the conversation among the MAC schools was our league play, so our weekly matches would be held online with the idea that the championships would be held in person somewhere. ... I think, for the fall, we’ll probably do our championships online.”
Said North, Jr.: “The only downsides I see could be the potential of upper administration not allowing the athletes to not participate in their designated spaces because of the social distancing. [Playing remotely] can be done. It’s definitely doable, but obviously it takes away that team chemistry component of being in the same space with your coach as well.”
The ESC plans to cycle games in through the fall and spring semesters with schedules depending on overall membership size of each school. The ESC champion of each game will advance to that title’s national collegiate postseason tournament. There is currently no official word of the conference delaying its inception in the fall.
“We’re pretty hopeful and pretty confident that whatever’s decided on for the fall titles, we’ll be able to field a team for that,” North, Jr., said.
First Published July 5, 2020, 5:27 p.m.
