Sophomore Clark Green finishes a CSGO match at his house, practicing for possible competitive matches in the future. Green is a member of the Har-Ber ESports team, which competes in multiple games at competitions.

“I joined the club because I thought it would be a new opportunity to meet new people who had similar interests as me, and to challenge myself in my interests,” Green said.

Computer science teacher Lindsey Shantanu is the sponsor of the club. The club has only existed for 2 years at Har-Ber, and offers competitive matches in multiple games.

“ESports at Har-Ber was founded by some seniors last year who were really interested in doing ESports. So I just used what they found for me, which is actually the biggest national competition, called High School ESports League, or HSEL,” Shantanu said.

Arkansas has been in the news recently due to the addition of a AAA sanctioned ESports program called Play VS. The Har-Ber ESports program competes in HSEL instead of Play VS, and because of this, is not a sanctioned AAA sport.

“Play VS only offers three games, while HSEL offers those three games plus countless others on PC, mobile, PS4, and XBOX. There’s way more selection. In our ESports, you’re playing somebody in your time zone,” Shantanu said.

ESports is an interesting sport in the fact that it is not necessarily a “team” competition. Individual members practice and compete on their own at home. However members like Green are looking forward to participating in something they enjoy.

“I am really looking forward to competitions that we will play in and I’m excited to help the team grow,” Green said.

Team members play in tournaments once a week on their respective game. They then hope to rise up the ranks and win one of the many prizes offered by the league.

“It’s super simple. You just look up the schedule and make sure it’s a night you can play, because it’s one game a week at five o’clock. Every game is played on a specific night. You just play from home, and the system sets up the matches for you. There is a leaderboard and it ranks everybody. There is a semifinals and then a finals round at the end, and if you’re one of the people that win, everyone in your team gets to choose $300 or a game console,” Shantanu said.

ESports has spread across the country, and is even played at colleges. Scholarship money can be awarded to the best gamers, and scouts from colleges pay attention to the HSEL games.

“You can sign up for college recruiting or getting scouted if you would like scouts to look at you play,” Shantanu said.

The relatively new club at Har-Ber is looking forward to a fun season of competing in a rapidly growing phenomenon across the world.