Waubonsee Community College's Esports team is set to begin post-season play next week to cap off their Spring 2021 season. The NJCAA recently released the playoff brackets for each of the sanctioned games they oversee nationally. The Chiefs will be competing for a potential National Championship in the team games of Rocket League and Hearthstone, while Alex Lindquist and Jacob Loizzo will be representing Waubonsee in the Super Smash Brothers post-season tournament.
In Rocket League the Chiefs' crew of Cameron Davis, Timothy Schramek, Zachary Stephenson and Tyler Hammer were one of 16 teams across the country that qualified for the playoffs. Waubonsee, which went 9-3 on the regular season, received the 7th-seed and will square off against the 10th-seeded Wake Tech Eagles from Raleigh, North Carolina who are also 9-3 on the season. The match is set for Thursday, April 22 beginning at 4:00 p.m.
Coach Jared Erickson's Chiefs were given the 4th seed in the 8-team Hearthstone Tournament. The 8-1 Chiefs will take on 5th-seeded Kingsborough Community College from Brooklyn, New York who is also 8-1 overall. That match will commence on Wednesday, April 21 starting at 5:00 p.m. The Rocket League and Hearthstone matches will be broadcast 'live' at www.Twitch.TV/WaubonseeChiefs
The Super Smash Brothers playoff bracket consists of 64 individuals from across the country. Lindquist is seeded 24th after going 8-1 during the regular season and is set to battle a player from Eastern Arizona College, who was seeded 41st overall. Loizzo finished with a 7-2 record and has been seeded 33rd overall. He will face the 32nd-seeded player from Montgomery County (PA) Community College in his first round match. Both matches are set to begin at 4:00 p.m. on Tuesday, April 20.
Rocket League is a fast paced, physics based soccer-like game in which two teams of three players each work together to knock the ball into the opposing team's goal. The players each control a car that can be uniquely customized to an individual's liking, but the basic functions of the vehicles are the same. The game is conducted over a five minute period of play that is non-stop due to the absence of any boundaries, and the clock only stops when a goal is scored. If the score is tied at the end of the five minute period, an unlimited sudden death overtime is played until a goal is scored.
Hearthstone is a turn-based card game between two opponents, using constructed decks of 30 cards along with a selected hero with a unique power. Players use their limited mana crystals to play abilities or summon minions to attack the opponent, with the goal of destroying the opponent's hero. Winning matches and completing quests earn in-game gold, rewards in the form of new cards, and other in-game prizes. Players can then buy packs of new cards through gold or microtransactions to customize and improve their decks.
Super Smash Brothers is a fighting game in which players work against one another to knock the other out of the arena within an 8-minute battle. In tournament play the participants fight one-on-one, choosing from a roster of characters from Nintendo and other third-party franchises. During the one-on-one battle each participant has three stocks (or lives) that must be reduced to zero before one fighter wins. Throughout the course of the battle each player accumulates damage, represented by the percentage displayed by their characters frame on the lower portion of the screen. The higher percentage of damage, the more easily they can be knocked out of the arena. However, this counter resets upon losing a stock.