The East Coast Conference (ECC) - an organisation dedicated to athletic competitions across colleges - has announced that they're introducing League of Legends as a sport and will host LoL seasons in 2019 and 2020, with the Peach Belt Conference (PBC) also bringing three more seasons of college League of Legends to their own players from 2019 to 2021.
"The East Coast conference is excited to be partnering with League of Legends and Riot Games as we move into the world of collegiate esports. We look forward to hosting our first season of League of Legends play in spring 2019 culminating in our championship tournament. And we are also looking to partnering with our NCAA DII colleagues at the Peach Belt conference to offer some conference crossover play as well. Working with Riot Games, we believe we will be able to offer a great experience to our ECC teams," said Dr. Robert Dranoff, ECC Commissioner.
"We are very excited to be continuing our relationship with Riot Games for another three years," added PBC commissioner David Brunk. "Our first season of League of Legends was groundbreaking in so many ways and we are grateful to Riot and Michael Sherman for their support through that season into our live conference championship. We appreciate their confidence in us to continue the relationship as we continue to build our League of Legends presence and establish the Peach Belt as a leader in collegiate Esports."
Starting next January schools from both the ECC and PBC can compete in the regular season of LoL before advancing into conference championships, with each then qualifying their champion and finalist into the League of Legends College Championship Play-In, battling against other schools for the chance to compete in the competition.
"Since Robert Morris University became the first school in 2014 to launch a varsity League of Legends program and offer scholarships for gamers, ambitious colleges and athletic conferences have looked for opportunities to bring esports to their students," said Michael Sherman, College Esports Lead for Riot Games. "We are working hard to continue expanding League of Legends into additional athletic conferences and are excited to have these two on board for future seasons."
Are you pleased to see more and more college esports programs take off?