From left, Jeremiah Wade Brache and Harshaan Padda brush up on their Rocket League skills at Clark-Pleasant Middle School on Thursday.
Jayden Kennett | Daily Journal
In its first year as a team, Clark-Pleasant Middle School’s esports team took home a State Championship title over the weekend.
The Indiana E-sports Network held its State Finals at Ball State University where 34 middle and high school teams competed for 17 different state championship titles. Tournaments for the games Valorant, Minecraft and Rocket League were held throughout the weekend.
Clark-Pleasant Middle School students competed in the Rocket League Tournament, winning first place.
Rocket League is like soccer with cars, Jeremy Gray, coach and 8th grade English Language Arts teacher said. The angle at which the ball is hit determines how fast and how far it goes and in-game mechanics such as launch pads help boost players. The rounds are five minutes long and students have to work together to score points to win.
The team has positions in the game, just like soccer or basketball would. They call plays and have strategies to score, Gray said.
Gray spends his time educating the students on tournament and competition aspects, and lets the student’s skills and talents shine through in the game. The students focus on the game and he focuses on the students, he said.
“I teach the kids — teamwork wins,” Gray said. “We have played with less qualified players and beat better teammates because we work together.”
Gray teaches the seventh and eighth-graders how to be leaders by example, how to accept defeat and do better next time, he said. Half of the students practice in the lab on Mondays and Wednesdays, while the other half practices on Tuesdays and Thursdays, Gray said. Students practice by running modules of specific gaming components like hitting the ball or jumping through hoops and more, Gray said.
The school just completed a new lab, equipped with gaming computers for the team just last week. Students have been practicing from home on their own consoles before then.
Gray encourages his students to be competitive while also having good sportsmanship, he said. He doesn’t let his students talk in chat or use emotes, an action, emotion or prompt an in-game avatar performs, but he does let his students be expressive as long as its appropriate, he said.
Seventh-grader Jeremiah Wade Brache has learned to “trust the process” since joining the team at the beginning of the year. Wade Brache has learned different play styles, how to work with different teammates and how to build confidence in himself since joining the team, he said. His friends may poke fun at him for playing esports, but fail to realize the competitiveness and skills it takes to play, he said.
Eighth-grader Harshaan Padda has been playing video games since he was young, but thought playing competitively was “scary” before joining the esports team, he said.
“Looking over at older pros that were really good, it’s like ‘If I go against them, I’m done.’ But play one game, you’re like ‘Oh wait, there’s other people are playing comp too,’ so you can fit in and you can get better,” Padda said.
Some people see esports as just playing video games, but its much more technical than that, Gray said. For that, Gray encourages people to check out professional-level esports competitions to see what it’s really about.
Beyond gaming, there’s something for everyone in esports, Gray said. Some students attended the state finals as volunteers helping with production aspects like running the live stream, scheduling and more, he said. Other students volunteered their graphic design skills to help personalize the team’s computers. Gray hopes students on the team will be a step ahead when exploring future career paths through the experiences.
“I actually think middle school is a better place to expose them to that because they have the time, they have the drive at that point, they see it as playing, but you’re really learning a lot of really good skills,” Gray said. “Then it just grows … It gives them a leg up. Then they get into high school and get another leg up. We could have kids in a few years coming out with more experience than some college kids and it’s all free. It’s all through public education.”
Programming events like healthy gaming habits, parents understanding intros to different games were held throughout the weekend as well. Although the middle school students are too young, esports programs from top colleges were recruiting at State Finals.
Gray hopes one day Clark-Pleasant can be known for a robust esports program, he said.
The competition can be viewed on twitch.tv at IndianaHSEN, BallStateUniversity, LOS_Scholastic and ManchesterUniversity Twitch accounts.
