Mike Jacobson is excited, and he can’t hide it.
Jacobson, the principal of Richards High School in Oak Lawn, and several other educators from around the state have been pushing hard for esports to become officially sanctioned by the Illinois High School Association. Their relentlessness has paid off.
“I’m super into video games,” Jacobson said. “This is my passion. I kept bringing this up to the IHSA and they finally were like, ‘Yeah, let’s give it a whirl.'”
This April, teams from schools across the state will participate in the first IHSA esports sectionals, and Richards will host one of them. Winners from those sectionals will vie for state titles in video games Rocket League, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate and NBA 2K. More games may be added down the road.
“We’re starting small because we just want to get it going,” Jacobson said. “We’re excited because, initially, we weren’t sure how many schools would sign up. And we had so many that we had to restructure how the sectional would work or the tournament would be 20 hours long.”
Under the IHSA, esports is considered a “competitive activity,” so it functions differently than sports. Schools do not need to have regular seasons for their esports teams; they can simply show up at sectionals. Schools can compete in other tournaments, but there is no seeding for sectionals, so those contests would mainly be for bragging rights.
“We had to keep it an activity, because many of these kids play in tournaments where they win money, and that would negate being able to be an athlete,” Jacobson said.
Another area school joining Richards in this first year of esports for Illinois high schools will be Evergreen Park Community High School, which began a season of tournaments Feb. 12, at Oak Lawn Community High School.
Schools are not required to field participants for every game, but Evergreen Park plans to do so, according to faculty sponsor Dan Truffa. Roughly 15 students are on the roster for this season’s team, with eight expected to take part in the sectional. Truffa said the high school also has a gaming club with about 50 students who meet once a month for more social purposes. Evergreen Park also has taken part in unsanctioned tournaments in the past, but the focus changes a bit now that it’s an IHSA event.
“Esports is more like practice,” Truffa said. “We’re working on particular games and preparing for tournaments.”
Some on the team already were playing competitively, just not through IHSA activities. Truffa’s role involves a little coaching of scenarios in games but is it more organizational than anything. He walks students through the expectations and rules for particular events.
At Richards, Jacobson said what excites him most is that the students are leading the way. While some adults may “coach” them, most of the students are “way more advanced,” he said, leaving the adults with little actionable feedback to give.
“I get very excited whenever anything is kid-led, kid-owned and kid-defined, because it puts them in a place to realize the world is theirs,” Jacobson said. “They just need to take it where they want to go.”
Truffa said he plays games a lot and got involved at school a few years ago when Evergreen Park started a club. Truffa said he would talk to the students about games and the idea that they could all be playing together after school to build relationships with their peers who have similar interests.
“It sort of grew from there into a much larger club,” Truffa said. “I think it’s just great for students to have the opportunity to compete in something they’re interested in and something that is different than your traditional events. My students aren’t the regular athletes in school, but they’re pretty good at what they do and they want to be able to represent the school in doing so.”
Richards has had a video gaming club for roughly six years and it has grown to more than 100 students who show up regularly. It is from that pool that the Bulldogs will pull their competitive team. Students can work on their skills in the club. Then, similar to a sport like wrestling, where the team may have multiple students in a weight class but can send only one, the sectional team will be built on qualifying opportunities such as challenge matches.
“The kids are excited because they’re part of it,” Jacobson said of the first-year process. “It allows these kids to have a larger sense of identity, even when they’re not playing.”
Evergreen Park held a “Future Mustang Game Night” earlier this month where middle schoolers got an enthusiastic look at the school’s tech lab, as well as chess and scholastic clubs, which has Truffa optimistic about the future of gaming at the school.
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“People are starting to realize this is part of the entertainment industry,” he said. “Even if these students don’t go on to be professional gamers, there are still plenty of opportunities for them in the field. It is just a great opportunity for them to share an interest and a hobby with their peers.”
Jacobson said while he thinks Richards will field a good team this year and the school loves to bring home trophies, that is never why they take part in these activities. Way too often, gaming is something youths experience alone in their basements, he said. This type of program brings the social students together with the introverts, the theater kids with the athletes.
“Put an adjective in front of the word kid and they’re in there,” Jacobson said. “Kids who normally wouldn’t vibe together, kids who don’t normally hang out together, it unifies them because they understand it. Every race, every gender, every identifier, and they come together because they like this thing. And while they’re playing this thing, all those differences fall away.
“That’s why I’m so passionate about it, because I see these kids making friendships they wouldn’t have made before, getting involved in school in a way they wouldn’t have before and seeing if you collaborate with somebody on a shared goal, magic can happen.”
Bill Jones is a freelance reporter for the Daily Southtown.