The Drury Panther varsity esports program, in partnership with Midwest Esports, has joined the newly formed Midwest Esports Conference (MEC) as a founding member. Drury joins seven other schools in this new conference with teams competing in League of Legends, with potential expansion into other titles in the future.
The newly formed league is also an official partner conference with the Riot Scholastic Association of America (RSAA), the organization started by Riot Games to govern collegiate and high school competition in League of Legends. Partnership with the RSAA means that MEC matches will be part of the official collegiate championship for League of Legends (CLoL). Participating teams will play their regular season matches at live events hosted by each member institution, and the winner of the conference will receive an automatic bid to the 32 team College Championship tournament.
“This is a unique opportunity for us and the other competing schools,” said head coach Michael Jones. “Previously, teams not affiliated with a partner conference were placed into one of four regional conferences. These featured a six game, round-robin regular season, with all the matches played online. The format for the MEC is exciting because it will not only allow for more than six games, but a better experience for the players and fans as every match will be in-person at LANs across the midwest.”
Midwest Esports, the group that organized the conference, has a long history of holding LAN events throughout the region. In addition to helping the member institutions organize their home events, Midwest Esports will be streaming select matches at each event on their Twitch channel.
The seven other schools participating in the MEC are: the University of Missouri (Columbia, MO), Wichita State University (Wichita, KS), Robert Morris University (Chicago, IL), Grandview University (Des Moines, IA), St. Ambrose University (Davenport, IA), Midland University (Fremont, NE), and Illinois College (Jacksonville, IL).
To keep up with the latest on the MEC, follow Midwest Esports on Twitter.
