SFCC Esports prepares for first season

State Fair Community College (SFCC) Esports Head Coach Jake Coleman, along with many departments on campus, have been busy preparing for what is to come, the beginning of the inaugural SFCC esports season. The new SFCC Esports Arena will be the home for the program located in room 500 in the Tech Two building on the east side of the SFCC campus.

"The first step in building our arena was identifying what titles the NJCAAE was going to compete in," said Coleman. "Since almost all of their titles were PC titles, that was a good indication for me that I needed to invest a large majority of our budget into personal computers as opposed to consoles. The next step was picking out the equipment. We also had to design the layout of the arena. With the help of our college facilities people, we had to hook up a whole new electrical panel to be able to provide extra power for the computers. Our IT Department and the people in charge of our network have been a huge help in making sure we can get everything up and running. These computers take a lot more power than your normal personal computer. We had our network team people install a switch in the room to make sure that everyone has fast and reliable internet. It was important for the arena to be a warm and inviting, friendly place not only for the current students but, also be able to be a recruiting tool for future students in the program."

SFCC will compete in NJCAA Esports, the national governing body for two-year college esports.

In the fall, SFCC will compete in the following titles, Call of Duty: Warzone, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, FIFA 21, Valorant, Rocket League, and Overwatch.

The process of starting the program and setting up the arena have been a time-consuming task for Coleman.

"One of the major challenges was trying to pick out equipment that would not only give us a competitive advantage now, but be able to sustain itself for the future," said Coleman. "We wanted reliable and fast equipment that will be sufficient for years to come."

Coach Coleman has been happy with the performance of his team in practice.

"I've been very impressed with our Rocket League team so far," said Coleman. "I think our Rocket League team will find a lot of success this semester."

Coleman has some goals he would like to see his team accomplish in the fall semester. He would like to go to the playoffs in at least two titles. Coleman sees a couple of keys to making that goal a reality.

"It's going to be a lot about the players continuing to develop their teamwork," said Coleman. "For example, all three of my Rocket League players are highly skilled individuals who have great mechanics on the game. It is going to be very important for them to continue to develop their ability to work as a team, that is what is going to make or break us. It has been a long road to get everyone here and get going but, we only want to improve from here. I would like to thank all the people on campus for their help. I'm blown away with how far we've come with this being our first semester as a program."

David Rohrbach

SFCC Athletics