- Louisiana State University will take the role of a virtual host for the CSL Esports Grand Finals
- The event will include matches in League of Legends, VALORANT, Dota 2, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, and Rocket League
- CSL will do the broadcast, and LSU will be in charge of putting content and branding into the live stream
Louisiana State University will play host to the CSL Esports Grand Finals as the university is looking to consolidate its footprint in the college esports space.
CSL Esports’ Plans for the Event Together with Louisiana State University
As the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic ruins the possibility of live events, Collegiate Starleague Esports announces the Louisiana State University as the virtual host of the CSL Esports Grand Finals.
Under normal circumstances, CSL would have worked directly with the school and hosted the tournament on campus. This way, the Grand Finals would have incorporated the schools’ various clubs’ help in the production, giving them opportunities to shine and popularizing esports at the same time.
However, this currently isn’t possible, CSL Esports’ CEO Rob Johnson lamented. Instead, CSL will be doing the event’s online broadcast, and LSU will help with adding branding and content to the stream. This would at least boost the popularity of LSU Esports, which is an organization that currently has over 300 members and several teams across the major esports titles. The Lousiana State University also hopes that the popularization of its esports organization will help to increase the flow of students to the establishment.
The Collegiate Starleague is one of the most esteemed and long-running college leagues and has been around since 2009. This year over 1500 students, representing as many as 448 schools, participated in the organization’s competitive events.
The Grand Finals are the culmination of the CSL’s esports events and will feature the best of the best collegiate teams taking on one another in some of the most popular esports titles, such as League of Legends VALORANT, Dota 2, Counter-Strike: Global Offensive, and Rocket League. The tournament will also be supported by HyperX and Twitch and will feature a prize pool of $60,000.
The CSL Esports Grand Finals starts at the beginning of May and will be streamed on CSL Esports’ official Twitch channel.
Despite the COVID-19 limitations, collegiate leagues have continued moving on. Catawba College has been working on providing students with an esports scholarship, the University of Arizona has launched its very own esports program, and the Northern Kentucky University has just opened a state-of-the-art esports arena.
