Washington esports team finishes first season undefeated

WASHINGTON — The tension in Room 122 was palpable. Around a dozen high school students gathered around a large screen, their eyes glued to the monitor as Snyder Ortega fought for a win in a 1v1 game of Super Smash Bros.

The team went into the Oct. 29 competition undefeated, but another victory would be key to an optimal placement in the playoffs. Ortega’s game, halfway through the round, would either break the Demons into a match-winning 11th point, or cede to Williamsburg the chance to claw back from a 9-2 deficit.

While the after-school activity started with casual banter around the room, teammates taking interviews from the local paper and practice matches happening on the sidelines, all that came to a halt as the game began. Between points, the only sound in the room came from the game itself as characters executed combos and light background music played.

And then, with the third point scored for the Demons, the entire room erupted into brief applause, as well as a massive collective sigh of relief. Snyder had won with enough points to prevent a sudden-death tiebreaker, and in so doing secured a seventh consecutive win for Washington’s esports team in its first-ever season. There were two games left in the match, but they would be played more for bragging rights than tournament-placing stakes.

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“We hoped to have a successful start of the program, definitely wasn’t expecting this,” said Coach Drew Ayrit after the games ended. “I’m just proud of these guys for working hard, and we saw a lot of improvement from our players over the course of the year, too. I think they deserve it.”

Already 6-0 going into Tuesday, the team had never before needed take a match to round three, beating every previous opponent in just two. But despite a reasonably clean victory in round one Oct. 29, the Demons faced a mix of unfavorable matchups and attention-breaking lag in the second set of games. Victory would depend on winning performances in round three.

It was just a taste of the tension teammates expect to feel in the playoffs, scheduled in Marshalltown Nov. 22.

Ortega played as Hero, a character from the game from Square Enix. His opponent was the Wii Fit Trainer, an odd but surprisingly effective character in the fighting game that combines virtually every successful Nintendo property, along with a few other recognizable video game characters.

In a post-round interview, Ortega said he knew his strategy for the match-up going in but acknowledged that it was too close for comfort, ending with a 3-2 tally. Competitive Smash Bros games end when the first player achieves three KOs.

“I knew they loved spamming projectiles, so I just had to get my move, bounce, where he just deflects all projectiles,” he said. “I kind of got unlucky, which is kind of my character’s main thing, you have to get lucky.”

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The win was hard fought by everyone on the Demons’ roster, and not every match went so well.

Going into round two, Washington swapped out one of its players for another, Collin Fritz, whose different character and go-to play style they hoped could throw off Williamsburg’s player who used K. Rool, a heavyweight character whose tanky build and close-range moveset presented a challenge to others on Washington’s team.

Fritz plays a character named Kazuya, known for his ability to implement high-damage combos at close range, but who struggles with enemies that can attack from afar.

He was placed in the lineup where they expected him to face K. Rool, only to find Williamsburg had a made a swap of its own for the same game of round two. Fritz would instead face an unfavorable matchup against King Dedede, a projectile-throwing character who could take plenty of hits without risking a knockout.

“I saw the last match with Dedede, and he’s probably better than me,” Fritz remarked ahead of the game, which he ultimately lost 2-3. “He’s really good, he’s scary. And he moves really good, too.”

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More common, however, were the wins.

Elijah Ide is the Demons’ star player, having won several competitions among the teammates to earn that title. As such, he’s usually placed at the front of their lineup to secure a strategic and morale-boosting victory at the top of every match.

He performed as expected on Tuesday, starting the day with a 3-0 victory — also known as a “three-stock” — playing a character named Joker. Ide rarely plays any of the game’s other 86 fighters, and said his strategy depended on him knowing details of every possible matchup.

“He’s sort of a light character, and he can combo, it’s sort of a perfect play style,” Ide said. “If there’s a heavy character, I can combo them easily. If it’s a light character, I can try to keep my distance and not go for combos, because they can easily get out of it.”

Asked how they practiced for games, most members of the team said they had played enough Smash Bros in their own time to start the season with sufficient skills. But when they started to play competitively, they sought out more intense training.

That usually comes from internal tournaments.

“I just play against Elijah, because he’s probably the best one out here,” said team member Luis Torrijos. “I practice with him to try to combos, try to edge-guard and get back into the groove of things, get back into the game.”

The team represents more than a place to play video games.

School officials approved esports as a sanctioned activity this year, when Activities Director Nathan Miller said it offered an extracurricular that would excite numerous students who were uninterested in most other clubs or sports.

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The program launched with the humble startup cost of $2,348. That covered the costs for a handful of Nintendo Switch consoles, $360 worth of game copies, a couple controllers and a subscription to Nintendo’s online service, which is required for certain multiplayer games.

“It offers an avenue for our students to be a part of another type of team activity,” Miller said at the time. “I think this program could open up a lot of pathways for kids.”

The esports team now looks to the playoffs, where they’ll bring their A-game with extensive preparation. Players plan to review footage of other qualifiers’ previous matches as well as their own, all of which were livestreamed, in the coming weeks as they work out new strategies and correct any frequent misplays.

In the meantime, they’ve got a moment of glory to soak in. An undefeated team is rare for any competitive activity, much less in a school’s first-ever season on the scene. Coach Ayrit also promised members a pizza party if they finished the season without a loss.

“I’m honestly blown away,” said teammate Kyann Miller. “We’ve just kind of blown up, out of nowhere.”

Comments: Kalen.McCain@southeastiowaunion.com