By David Fleet
Editor
Atlas Twp. — Seth Tison, an Atlas Township resident is on his way to Dallas with The Oakland University Grizzlies Rocket League varsity Esports program. The Golden Grizzlies team won a spot in the Rocket League World Championship at the Kay Bailey Hutchison Convention Center earlier this year and are only one of seven teams that qualified in the United States. The team will be playing against 16 other colleges around the world.
The OU team secured a berth in the World Championships by defeating Louisiana State University and then by beating Penn State University. Tison earned a spot on the team in 2020 as a OU freshman
where he studies mechanical engineering.
“I started out casually playing at home, although our internet is very poor at our home,” said Tison. “Then when COVID hit I had more time to play. I tried out for the OU team and made the cut.”
Each team has six players on the roster; two subs and a coach. Three play at one time.
“The games go really fast,” he said. “Our chances of winning are pretty good. It will be tough match play as we take on the #1 ranked European team Technical University of Berlin.
The OU Rocket League team is one of the top 10 teams of 508 in North America and in the top 16 worldwide with more than 1,000 teams.
Tison describes the game played in the world championship as playing soccer with rocket powered cars.
Players on the squad include: Jake “Jwismont” Wismont, Edward “Rahz” Azzam, Justin “Jcubed” Janulewicz, Seth “Tisonic Boom” Tison, Matthew “ML” Leuker and Billy “Mega” Sawyer. The Golden Grizzlies can be watched on the stream link http://twitch.tv/rocketleague.