QUT Students Receive First Australian University Esports Scholarships

Five QUT students have been selected to be the first Australian students to receive scholarships for esports, along with a position on the QUT Tigers team as they compete in the League of Legends Oceanic Challenger Series (OCS). The students will each receive the $10,000 scholarship offered under the QUT Vice-Chancellor’s Scholarship program as elite athletes, similar to players who are members of other sporting teams.

The members of the team will comprise of two students who were QUT Tigers in 2018, along with three students who will begin studying at the university this year. The members of the team are as follows:

• Jason `hi and goodbye’ Nguyen, 18, of Yeerongpilly
• Zihong `Unspecialized’ Li, 22, of Inala, studying Bachelor of Games and Interactive Entertainment.
• Henri `Feint’ Magisson, 20, of Kenmore Hills, studying Bachelor of Engineering.
• Michael `Frogadog’ Cornish, 22, of Sandgate, studying a Bachelor of Business, majoring in accounting.
• Justin `Spoil’ Tu, 23, of Carindale, studying Bachelor of Engineering, majoring in medical engineering.

QUT esports coordinator Dylan Poulus said the players underwent a rigorous assessment process that included looking at past esports experience and an independent assessment of their performance in a weekend of trials.

“Between now and their first game in April, we've got a pretty rigorous preseason lined up for the guys that obviously coincides with that first semester of university,” Mr. Poulus said. “And so, we've got to balance both their professional commitment to play League of Legends for us and their academic commitment to QUT. They're going to train for more than 20 hours per week at times playing League of Legends and that will be supplemented alongside a physical training regime, a psychological training regime and then diet interventions from the high-performance support team.”

Emily Rosemond, coordinator of QUT Sport and the Elite Athlete Program said the university was leading the way in enacting a High-Performance approach to esports players in the same way they approach traditional sporting teams and athletes.

“There will be plenty of crossover with the elite athletes studying at QUT,” she said. “They will be invited to all events and development opportunities that we run for our elite athlete cohort. They'll also be part of the College of Excellence Program. There's learning on both sides. Our eSports team can learn from traditional sports performance models and vice versa. The evolution of eSports and the industry itself is something that traditional sports will need to embrace for future growth and development to stay current. “