The UTD esports team took a narrow defeat in one of its biggest challenges during the Oct. 4 weekend: DreamHack Atlanta, an LAN event featuring a multitude of games including Overwatch 2, Valorant and Rocket League.
LAN events are in-person tournaments usually held in a large physical space, and DreamHack is one of the largest tournament circuits for LAN events in the world, sporting five different events across the globe. DreamHack’s Collegiate Invitational had a selective process for its contenders — with only the best teams in the U.S., based on recent performance and regional prominence among other factors, eligible for an invite — to play in front of a live audience for a total of $2,000 in prize money split across three games. The games were played simultaneously, keeping a fire raging throughout the three-day weekend.
The weekend kicked off with the Comets facing the East Tennessee State University Buccaneers in a 16-team Rocket League tournament. The Comets fell to them in the first bracket, losing 0-3. They continued their run later in the evening to play against King’s University, and in a close 2-3, were booted out of the Rocket League tournament.
In Overwatch 2, eight teams competed for a prize pool of $750. The tournament had a group stage that followed the round robin style, where all competitors play against one another and the competitor that amasses the largest amount of wins receives the best seeding. The Comets winning and losing one game each led them to becoming second in their group and placing against Winthrop University in the playoffs. They fell in a 0-3 series in the semifinals.
Comets on the Valorant team saw more success in the eight-team tournament, placing first in their round robin stage by beating the other three teams in their group. This placed them in the semifinals to play against Mizzou University, and their undefeated streak continued upon beating Mizzou 2-0. Afterward, the Comets headed to the grand finals against Winthrop University once more.
In the Valorant grand finals, the Comets met their match and subsequently lost 0-2 in the best of three, leaving them in second place at the Valorant invitational. The team took home $250 from the Valorant prize pool.
While UTD didn’t bring any trophies home from DreamHack, UTD esports still ranks highly in the nation, with the Overwatch 2 team remaining one of the top 16 collegiate teams and multiple players from the Rocket League team remaining in the top 100 standard global leaderboard of the game.
