Six former Stay Plugged In players - representing three colleges from across the country - qualified for the Collegiate Rocket League spring season on Sunday, January 30th. Collegiate Rocket League, also known as CRL, is the official Rocket League competition for collegiate esports in North America. The 2022 season will feature 32 teams, divided into Eastern and Western Conferences.
In Sunday’s qualifier event, Stay Plugged In players from St. Clair College (Comp, Jay, and Nitryx), Boise State University (Gil), and Ottawa University (Otis and Taos) advanced to league play and will not need to compete in this weekend’s second CRL qualifier. This season’s competition will consist of 16 teams from each conference and will feature round-robin style brackets, with the top 8 teams from the East and West advancing to the playoffs. Additionally, CRL offers a total of $100,000 in scholastic awards, which is an amazing incentive for players.
"Being able to play in college - especially with my teammate's danger and instinqt, and for Boise State - is absolutely unreal. I could not ask for better people around me every day to work and play with,” commented Gabriel “Gil” Reynolds, Rocket League player for Boise State University. “As for when we made CRL, what an unreal experience, especially in the moment. To make it in on the first qual and also put Boise State in CRL for the first time is such an amazing accomplishment. Our whole team wanted to make it so bad and we played extra scrims over the semester break and leading up to the qual so we could have this chance. I am so excited to see what we can do in CRL!”
Stay Plugged In is focused on helping esports players navigate their college recruitment journey, and having former players qualify for advanced competitions is always exciting. With the second round of qualifiers approaching, the staff at Stay Plugged In are eagerly waiting to see if more former players will qualify for the upcoming CRL season.
Speaking about the two Rocket League players he recruited from Stay Plugged In, Sergio Brack (Director of Esports at Ottawa University) commented,
“within our current Rocket League team, Otis has a ton of room to grow as a player and has been waiting for the opportunity to play on a CRL team of this caliber. His work ethic has already shown it; he's easily the X factor of the Ottawa Braves Rocket League team.”
“Taos is one of the most textbook players within CRL,” added Brack. “Without making the flashiest plays, he still performs consistently throughout all of our games and provides clutch gameplay on both sides of the field. Beyond his in-game prowess, Taos is also a GREAT student and future leader within the program as a whole. Whether it be academically or socially, he always is on top of his pursuits out of the game as well."
Collegiate Rocket League continues with another qualifier event on February 6th. Official league play begins February 14 and continues every Monday through March 14, leading up to conference playoffs and the Spring Championship in late March.
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