Prairie High School has a state champion you may not have heard of. One of the school’s esports teams recently took home top honors in the Washington State Scholastic Esports Association fall Overwatch 2 tournament, beating Selah High School in a best-of-three match.
“After we lost the first round of the finals we were like, ‘We’ve been in this position before, we just need to focus up and take the win,” said team captain Cody Sigler. “We adapted and played the way we wanted to play. After we squeaked out a win in the second map, that gave us the confidence going into the tiebreaker.”
“I think one of the reasons this team had so much success is because they’re really good at communicating,” said team coach Simeon Redberg, a science teacher at Prairie. “They never panicked or started blaming each other. They just regrouped, came back in the second game and beat them in overtime.”
Prairie went 6-0 in the regular season and 3-0 in the playoffs to claim the league title.
Esports is a relatively new opportunity for high school students in Washington. Battle Ground Public Schools took part in an esports pilot by the Washington Interscholastic Activities Association during the 2022-23 and 2023-24 school years, but WIAA dropped the sport this year, citing a lack of schools willing to participate.
Prairie coach Simeon Redberg said he was happy to see WSSEA step in to provide opportunities for students to remain involved.
“I just love that we have this opportunity,” Redberg said. “Most of the kids doing esports aren’t involved in other more traditional sports. The communication and leadership skills you get from working on a team, a lot of people might miss out on that if they don’t like to participate in other sports.”
Sigler and his teammates, Kameah Suong, brothers Adrian and Brandon Gallardo and Brasharee White, said they don’t necessarily have plans to make esports a career. Currently, only about the top 20 players in the world make significant income from the sport. But all noted that the time and effort it takes to become good enough to play at the high school or collegiate level is similar to any other sport.
“After our practices we would sometimes scrimmage against other teams, even college teams,” Sigler said. “That’s something I don’t think a lot of other teams did.”
Battle Ground High School also offers an esports program. Current league offerings include a fall season featuring Overwatch 2, Splatoon 3 and Street Fighter. Winter season, going on now, includes Mario Kart, Super Smash Bros., Apex Legends and Guilty Gear: Stryve.
Esports, along with traditional sports and other after-school activities, are an important part of the school experience for many students. It encourages teamwork and communication, while providing incentives to maintain grade-level requirements for participation. Local levy funding helps to pay for many of these programs, including the district’s middle school sports offerings.