Madden NFL launches multi-year collegiate program across 2,500 campuses EAElectronic Arts and Learfield IMG College have entered a multi-year partnership to find future esports stars at colleges. [jwplayer q2PHNyT5] Level Next, The College Esports League, is said to support over 2,500 campuses across the United States and starts with Madden NFL 21. Beginning on November 9, registration is open to all college students that are attending a four-year accredited university. The league will \u201cfeature at least one of EA\u2019s esports franchises\u201d and serves as the gaming company\u2019s official home for collegiate esports. There\u2019s no word on other titles that the league may adopt in the future but EA are also behind FIFA, NHL, and Apex Legends. Taking collegiate esports to the next level? An eight-week regular season will lead to playoffs and a culminating championship, with the winning team being named the national champions. The Fall Champions Series will have a $150,000 total prize pool. The Madden NFL 21 Championship Series is the official top flight of competition for the American football game and includes sponsors such as Pizza Hut, Snickers, Verizon, and Gillette. The 2021 Club Championship, which is part of the series is set to give out $750,000 across its competitors. \u201cUntil now, collegiate esports has been primarily small-scale, community-based and fragmented. This program will bring the excitement and camaraderie of college competition to a new level,\u201d said Todd Sitrin, SVP of EA\u2019s competitive efforts. \u201cBy leveraging EA\u2019s decades of experience at the intersection of traditional sports and esports, and Learfield IMG College\u2019s unprecedented scale and position as the official rights holder for more than 200 universities and conferences, this collaboration will establish a much-needed structure within the collegiate esports ecosystem and help accelerate Madden NFL competitive gaming popularity.\u201d The ultimate goal of Level Next is to \u201cunify competitive play at universities nationwide,\u201d which also provides a platform for up-and-coming talent to show off their abilities. Much like in traditional sports, esports organizers are looking to schools and colleges to create a talent pipeline across multiple gaming titles.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Madden NFL launches multi-year collegiate program across 2,500 campuses EAElectronic Arts and Learfield IMG College have entered a multi-year partnership to find future esports stars at colleges. [jwplayer q2PHNyT5] Level Next, The College Esports League, is said to support over 2,500 campuses across the United States and starts with Madden NFL 21. Beginning on November […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-21912","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21912","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=21912"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/21912\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=21912"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=21912"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dejan.au\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=21912"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}