EGF ANNOUNCES COLLEGIATE FOUNDERS INVITATIONAL TOURNAMENT

New York, NY (November 19, 2019) The Electronic Gaming Federation (EGF) today announced the launch of its third national collegiate preseason tournament for competitive esports teams. The EGF Collegiate Founders Invitational, to be held January 25 and 26, 2020, will honor the founding members of the EGFC Esports League. 

The tournament features Metro Atlantic Athletics Conference (MAAC) schools comprised of Canisius College, Marist College, Niagara University, Saint Peter’s University and Siena College.  Others include esports powerhouses such as the University of Delaware, Rochester Institute of Technology (RIT) and University of Texas at Arlington. These competitive esports teams will compete in four weeks of preliminary matches beginning the week of November 18, 2019 to determine tournament seeding. 

 The EGF Collegiate Founders Esports Invitational joins the EGF BIG EAST Esports invitational and the EGF Power Five Esports Invitational as the third in the tournament series. These three will prepare teams for the 2020 EGFC League Season I, which begins on February 1, culminating in leading teams across all titles joining for the EGFC National Championship held in April 2020.

Live coverage of the prelims and tournament play will be streamed on Twitch.tv/officialEGF. The 2020 EGFC League Season I plans to by expanded to include a variety of top tier esports titles across MOBA, RTS (Real Time Strategy), fighting games and sports titles (e.g. FIFA/Madden)

 Founded in 2015, EGF is widely recognized as the leading national governing body for organized high school level and collegiate varsity esports leagues. In July, the EGF announced its collaboration with Walt Disney World® Resort to launch the EGF High School National Championships at Walt Disney World® Resort held in June 2020 at ESPN Wide World of Sports in Florida.  

 “We highly value our founding members for their commitment to the EGFC League and look forward to this invitational series as well as in Season I beginning in February, 2020.” said Tyler Schrodt, EGF Founder and CEO.  “EGFC membership provides governance, program development and financial support for all collegiate Division One programs. This is just one way that EGF is expanding the amateur foundation of the esports industry.”

”The MAAC is proud to partner with EGFC, not only for this Founders Invitational, but in particular for Season I of play this spring,” Commissioner Rich Ensor of the Metro Atlantic Athletic Conference. “We value this strategic partnership with the EGFC as it endeavors to bring organization and visibility to the collegiate esports scene.”

Esports is one of the fastest growing activities in the world. Industry analysts have estimated that over 2 billion people worldwide play or watch esports across all gaming titles. By 2022, the growth of esports from a competition and viewer standpoint is expected to exceed 300 million  participants. Collegiate programs began in earnest in 2015 and now feature more than 150 collegiate programs. Division I schools are getting serious about esports with strong growth in official programs and the EGFC League national competition.