Medford eighth graders complete first year of Esports competition

Getting swept in three games of Rocket League by Cambria-Friesland and Racine Horlick Thursday wasn’t how they wanted it to go, but the contests marked the end of a successful first year for the Esports teams at Medford Area Middle School.

With the formation of the MAMS team this fall, Medford was part of a quickly growing list of schools joining the Wisconsin High School Esports Association, which was formed in 2017.

In the current second-semester season, the WIHSEA has three divisions of varsity teams playing Rocket League with two conferences each for a total of 52 teams. As a middle school team, Medford’s A and B teams were automatically placed at the junior varsity level where there were four groups with two conferences each for a total of 72 teams, many of which featured high school players.

Currently, the varsity division is in its two-week season-ending playoffs.

Kevin Wellman is the program’s coach, bringing the program to MAMS eighth graders after learning all about it in seminars last summer. The plan is to expand the program to the high school next year with Tran Brooks overseeing those players. Wellman said he has four weeks of summer camp planned –– two weeks for high school players and two weeks for middle school players –– to carry momentum into next year.

“It’s been such a good thing,” Wellman said. “I could’ve had 40-50 kids but we just don’t have that many computers. We only had eighth grade this year and we’ll probably only be eighth grade next year (at MAMS).”

The goal of Esports is to bring a competitive level to video games, working in many aspects of traditional sports such as team communication, leadership and time management. The second-semester season went 12 weeks with two weeks of warm-up, two weeks of pre-season and eight weeks of competition on Thursdays. The team practiced after school on Mondays and Tuesdays as well.

In the fall, the team made its debut by playing Overwatch, a game that featured six versus six competition, over a threemonth period.

“I enjoy it a lot,” said Diezel Pocock, a member of Medford’s Rocket League A team. “This is something that we do a lot. We game at home a lot, so this is just a perfect opportunity. When I heard they were bringing Esports, I was super happy.”

“I was one of the first people signed up,” Charlie Newberry said.

Rocket League is a game that, in a nutshell, looks like soccer played with cars. Three players work together to put the giant ball into their opponent’s net and keep it out of their net, using a variety of moves and jumps and the ability to temporarily disable an opposing car by blowing it up.

“Anybody can learn the game in five minutes, but it’s really hard to be really good,” Wellman said.

On Thursday, Pocock, Newberry and Hunter Mantell were Medford’s A team. Mantell filled in for the absent Gatlin Piller.

“You want to be able to work together,” Pocock said. “You have to work really well with your teammates and have good communication. Have roles if you can.”

“You have to know what your strengths are,” Newberry said. “Diezel’s a really good goalie. Hunter’s really good at offense and scoring.”

“I’ve been trying to get more offensive, so I can go back and forth if I have to,” Pocock said. “At home I’ve been playing offensive. I’ll stay at halfcourt sometimes and aerial the ball into the goal. Or if it’s coming toward my side I’ll go back and save the ball.”

“My skill set is defend as much as possible and blow up as many cars as I can,” Newberry said.

Team members who played for Medford’s Rocket League B team Thursday included Wyatt Kauffman, Andrew Boehlen, Dalton Matyka and Gabriel Standke.

The fall season of Overwatch required more players and, according to the players interviewed, is a game they enjoy more.

“You have to escort a payload, so if you can protect it and get it farther than the other team, you win,” Wellman said. “So in the first round, you’re pushing it and the other team is trying to stop you. Then in the second round, you switch and whoever gets it further you win.”

In Overwatch, the six players on the team are split with two playing as characters in one of three classes –– tank, damage or support. Getting to know the characters and how to use their strengths is the fun yet challenging part of the game.

“There are so many characters and so many different abilities,” Pocock said. “They’re all different. I’ll either be a tank and stay in front or I’ll be a healer because Brigitte has a shield and rams people and knocks them out. I can also heal people with heal packs. I also like being Junkrat and just throwing C4 at people.

“Sombra turns invisible and can go and hack people,” Newberry said. “They can’t use their abilities after she hacks people. I’m more the sneak up from behind player. I also like Baptiste when I have to be the support character because he has an assault rifle which has heal- ing grenades. He heals them. When he crouches he can jump higher.”

“I’m the weird one. I’m good with either the characters no one plays or everyone else is bad at,” Mantell said. “For attacking I’m Doomfist which is basically a character with a shotgun.”

“His knuckles have holes and it shoots bullets or he has a big arm that he can punch people with really fast or launch himself in the air and smack them,” Pocock said of Doomfist.

“I like Moira,” Mantell added. “She’s basically a vampire. If she drains the enemy’s health, it goes into her health. She can actually spray out healing power.”

“We had two six-person teams,” Wellman said of the Overwatch season. “That was the game where we were definitely better. The last game of the year, we played the best team in our division and took them right up to the end in every single match. They ended up beating us 3-1. It’s best out of five. Our record didn’t really show that we were great, but we got to be really good.”

Overall the WIHSEA conducts leagues in four games. Smite and Super Smash Brothers. Technical limitations prevented Medford from joining those leagues. The association does not offer any games that are rated M for Mature or feature excessive realistic violence. The Esports culture is also growing quickly at the collegiate level and schools are offering scholarships to top-scoring graduates at the high school level.

Along with the expansion to the high school next year, which excites this year’s eighth graders, Wellman is planning a few more advancements for season two of Esports in Medford.

“While I’m spectating here (in the MAMS computer lab), I’ll be able to record the whole game and then we’ll go back in and put commentary and then we’ll put it on a Glitch channel or Youtube channel,” he said. “I’ve already had kids who’ve said they don’t want to play but they’d like to broadcast. That type of broadcasting is called shoutcasting. The kids want to do that.”

Plaques were presented last week at Holy Rosary Catholic School and Medford Area Middle School to age group winners in the local free throw championship competition conducted by the Knights of Columbus Medford Council 1744. Awards at Holy Rosary, presented by Bruce Daniels, Tyler Kircher and Mike Bub include Melanie Richter (age 9 girls), Gracie Strama (age 10 girls), Lillian Metz (age 11 girls), Scott Wolf (age 10 boys), Anthony Husser (age 9 boys) and Chloe Pipkorn (age 12 girls).KATIE ZENNER PHOTO

Free throw championship winners from Medford Area Middle School included Dylan Frey (age 11 boys), Will Daniels (age 12 boys) and Nick Krause (age 13 boys). Winners are determined in each age class by the most made free throws in 15 attempts.MATT FREY/THE STAR NEWS