SMSU Esports Competes at National Level

Published Monday, May 04, 2026

Esports at SMSU

For the first time in team history, the Southwest Minnesota State University Esports program will have a team competing at the National Esports Collegiate Conference National Tournament finals on Wednesday, May 6, 2026.

SMSU, which began competing in Esports in the fall of 2020, has its ‘Smash Brothers’ team in action on Wednesday at 6 p.m. CDT versus Waynesburg University. The ‘Smash Brothers’ team is filled with freshmen and one sophomore.

During this run in the tournament, SMSU has defeated Kansas State, the University of Alaska Fairbanks, and Marywood. SMSU placed third during the regular season before earning second place during this season’s playoff bracket.

The national tournament for Esports takes the top 16 teams in the division over the course of the year and seeds each team based on performance over the course of the year. SMSU entered the national tournament as the eight seed.

Fans can watch the match at twitch.tv/smsuesports

Update 05/07/26: SMSU lost the best of 3 in game 3. With that loss, SMSU Esports is done for the summer and will resume play in the fall.

"It was an incredibly close series and came down to a last hit situation. It's very rare to get that close and I'm really proud of the students for representing SMSU so well at the national level," said Esports coach, Spencer Louwagie.

Students interested in participating in the SMSU Esports are encouraged to reach out to Spencer Louwagie at spencer.louwagie@SMSU.edu