Overwatch, Smash premier teams host tryouts
By Kyle Hornik
It’s “game on” for Mizzou’s premier Overwatch and Super Smash Bros. teams, after both sides held open tryouts in August for students interested in joining the competitive teams.
Over the summer, both teams sent out interest forms to the student body gauging interest in joining the premier teams. Promotions for the tryouts also went out on Mizzou Esports’ twitter.
Prior to the start of the semester, premier Overwatch team manager Christina Sherman conducted a short interview process to determine if players would fit better with the title’s club or premier competitive team.
Instead of traditional scrimmage matches with other collegiate teams, the tryouts were conducted in an internal PUG game amongst each other. “We did this internal-style PUG rather than a scrim with a different collegiate team so we could control the teams and really take our time analyzing the new players,” Sherman said.
Following tryouts, the team manager and various returning team members convened and shared thoughts and impressions of the possible new players from the games, and the team roster was finalized. The new players were notified the next day with feedback on their game and whether they were invited to join the team.
The premier Smash team had a similar setup for their open tryouts. Mizzou Esports Interim General Manager Brady Graves helped organize and conduct the tryouts.
“Our Smash tryout process was a round-robin tournament to decide the best four players at Mizzou.” Graves said.
The in-person tryouts consisted of 14 of the university’s top players, of which the top four were chosen to be a part of the team.
The round-robin style allowed players to match against various characters and play styles and test their skills against the top-tier competition.
Graves and the rest of Mizzou Esports are excited to see what the four new members and the new Smash Premier team can accomplish this semester.