On Oct. 25, Oklahoma City University Esports hosted an OKC public schools Esports tournament. 70 students from 12 schools participated in the event. Public schools that are part of the OKCPS program include Capitol Hill, Classen SAS, Douglass, Emerson North, Emerson South, John Marshall, Northwest Classen, Putnam Heights, Southeast, Star Spencer, and U.S. Grant. Each school sent a team of 6 students to compete in Super Smash Brothers and Rocket League. OKCPS recently announced the expansion of its Esports program to every OKCPS high school.
“Esports supports developmental growth in students, including communication and leadership skills. Participation in Esports can also help students handle stress, make tough decisions, commit to a process, and work collaboratively,” states OKCPS.
“I don’t know if it’s the future of sports but it’s definitely [an up and] coming field and will probably compete very well with the popularity of physical sports,” said Drake Brown, a sophomore Film major and the off support for the Overwatch team.
“My favorite aspect is absolutely the teamwork,” said Edward Bennet, a sophomore who serves as DPS on the Overwatch team. “Being able to work together with a group of people, and achieve things that you can’t working solo, makes everything so much more rewarding. The community of not only my team, but of Esports in general, is so welcoming and heartwarming,”
A majority of the computers in the Starcade come from the gaming computer company Legion which is a branch of Lenovo. The system build of the Legion computers is Core I7, 2060 GPU, 16gbs ram, and a 1TB SD. Each computer is accompanied by a 240hz Alienware monitor.
“I really like them, I think they’re really good. They’ve had some problems in the past but they do pretty good.” Said Cole Fairchild a sophomore Film Production major and the Main-Tank of the Overwatch team.
“We currently have some new machines with 3070s coming from Asus waiting in the port of LA.” said Esports Coach Patrick McClung. He says the new systems will arrive on campus soon. “Our current upgrade path is 3-5 years,” said McClung.
OCU Esports has Rocket League and Overwatch matches every Monday at 6 pm. “Everyone is welcome to come cheer on the teams in person. Or watch our stream at twitch.tv/oklahomacityuniversity” said Coach McClung.
Leave a Reply