Dec. 11—Lakeland Community College recently added a new sport to its athletic department.
And what a successful inaugural campaign it was for the Lakers, as freshman Ackema Royes competed in the National Junior College Athletic Association Esports FIFA 23 Finals.
Sadly, for the Lakers, Royes, playing solo, was matched up against the defending champion at Westchester Community College (Valhalla, New York) and was defeated 3-1.
Though Lakeland “took an L,” Royes remains upbeat.
“I felt the season went pretty well overall — coming into the match, I knew my opponent was good, so credit him for his quality play,” he said. “We really spent time trying to analyze his play, and I practiced different strategies to try to get the win.
“Overall, I was really proud of being the runner-up….we represented Lakeland really well,” he added. “I’m definitely looking forward to a rematch next semester.”
A new sport embraced
Friends and family watch Lakeland Lakers Overwatch battle for supremacy during a playoff match at the school campus. Overall, the school, thanks to Ackema Royes, finished second in another game match. (Chad Felton ??
Lakeland began competing in the NJCAAE league during the fall 2022 season.
According to the school, esports is organized virtual gaming in which individuals or teams compete against each other in tournament-style play.
In addition to FIFA, where Lakeland entered the playoffs with a 7-0 regular-season mark, the Lakers competed in NBA2K (6-1) and Overwatch (5-1) during the season.
“We’ve had a successful first season and are looking forward to continuing the momentum into the spring season,” said Head Coach Chad Jordan, who also works as a student success navigator in Lakeland’s Learning Center.
The NJCAAE, founded in 2019, is the only national esports association exclusively for two-year colleges.
After just five semesters of competition, 125 schools from all regions of the United States have joined the league.
“Esports is growing,” Jordan said, “and it’s becoming the fastest-growing sport on college campuses. And there are careers within the esports space, not just in playing — this includes tournament organization, coaching, content creation/streaming and shoutcasting (play-by-play).”
Of course, he added, it starts even earlier as hundreds of high schools, in addition to two- and four-year colleges, are now offering esports scholarships and transfer opportunities.
The genesis
The idea to introduce an esports team first came to Lakeland’s Director for Athletics Scott Barlow in early 2020, and after gaining support from the college administration to launch the program, it became a reality.
“While the COVID-19 pandemic pushed our timeline back a bit, with everything going virtual, it also showed us that we are capable of hosting a team and tournaments on campus from a technology standpoint,” Barlow said. “This also allowed us time to speak with students and really garner up interest in the program.”
Esports is recognized as a varsity sport, he added, meaning students need to be enrolled full-time and must meet academic eligibility standards to compete. Esports is the eighth organized sport — and the only coed sport — offered by Lakeland.
In addition to being a varsity sport, an intramural club has also been started.
Overall, Lakeland had five varsity and three club competitors on its roster for the fall semester, Jordan noted.
“We hope the intramural club can serve as a pipeline for the varsity team,” he said. “Students may not meet the enrollment or academic eligibility for the varsity team, but can still participate in the club on campus. Meanwhile, if a student is interested in competing at a higher level, we can work on developing their skills and meeting eligibility requirements to eventually join the varsity team.”
Looking forward
Barlow expects more offerings to come from the program in the future.
“Launching the team is really just the first step — there is a lot of potential to grow the program into more than just a varsity sport,” he said. “Schools across the country have taken the interest and success of esports and created academic programs, from management degrees to information technology and computer science degrees….there are many different aspects of the game that come into play and other opportunities to consider offering our students.”
Lakeland is currently recruiting for its spring semester season.
“We are looking to grow our current roster to compete in various games,” Jordan said.
For more information, contact Chad Jordan at cjordan14@lakelandcc.edu or Scott Barlow at sbarlow@lakelandcc.edu.