Northside Christian College will look to continue their unbeaten run in the Queensland League of Legends Championship as the competition moves to the finals this weekend.
The Brisbane school has delivered an impressive campaign during this split – the first of its kind for a statewide high school League of Legends competition in Queensland.
They will meet Tamborine Mountain College in their semifinal on Saturday with an opportunity to advance to Sunday’s grand final.
The other Queensland semi final features St Peter Claver College against Good Shepherd Catholic College.
Sunday’s grand final will get underway at 2pm AEST and will be streamed online on Twitch.tv/highschoolleague.
But to make it there, Northside will need to continue their winning ways.
Maitlohn Drew is the teacher in charge of esports at Northside and he said the interest in esports had grown greatly during the past few months.
“The [league] has been well received by the school community. Esports is a new venture for our school, so we have kept things a little low-key this time around,” Drew said.
“But we are certainly hoping the competition continues in the future – we’ll definitely have plenty of eager students wanting to be involved.”
Drew said they had a plan in place for this weekend.
“The team will go into the game with some predetermined strategic goals, a focus on staying calm and relaxed whilst keeping up some solid communication.”
St Peter Claver experienced only one loss during this split, against Northside, and will start as warm favourites against Good Shepherd Catholic College.
George Maliwat, an IT and maths teacher at St Peter Claver, said the team had relied on a consistent strategy during the split.
“Teamwork, good in-game communication, always try to get ahead early and then play more aggressive once we’re in the lead,” he said.
As for this weekend, Drew said the system wouldn’t change.
“We will practice together more, have good synergy, maintain good communication and don’t blame each other when things don’t go our way.”
Tournament Director Matt Ross said he had been impressed with the talent on display in Queensland during the inaugural split.
“Queensland is often an overlooked region in Australian League of Legends but I’ve been blown away by the high school support here,” Ross said.
“Northside Christian College are coming into the semifinals as the strong favourites, not dropping a single game during the round robin. Even in their match against the second seed, St Peter Claver College, it seemed to be a very one sided game in Northside’s favour.
“Good Shepherd Catholic College also had a great showing during the round robin but will need to step up their game if they want to take the title of the first Queensland champions.”
