Tuesday the 9th of August welcomed Student Showdown - the first inter-school esports live event in the Western Cape since the lockdown was ended.

The world is returning to how it once was, and so is the competitive nature of esports. The Student Showdown hosted competitors from high school and tertiary institutions, bridging the gap between various levels of play to find the current ultimate teams and players. A total of 102 students from 10 different institutions signed up to play at Paul Roos Gymnasium in Stellenbosch, who kindly offered their campus as a venue.  

Students at the event competed in CS:GO (5v5), Rocket League (3v3), FIFA 22 (PlayStation) and Clash Royale.

The day did not go without its challenges as the Steam CS:GO servers were at times unstable due to a recent update. This issue caused some delays and the CS:GO stream was cancelled due to quality concerns. 

The Rocket League stream went ahead with Greybeard and Ultruism casting Paul Roos Gymnasium A (PRG A) vs the University of Cape Town’s first team (UCT A). This was the second time of the day that PRG A and UCT A would face off after a 2-1 win in group stages in favour of PRG A. With the mental edge and consistent mechanics PRG A would go on to win 4-0 in the best of 7 finals.

CS:GO saw the high schools competing furiously against each other in a multitude of close games. Rondebosch Boys High School showed up and proved why they are considered to be one of the best CS:GO high school teams in South Africa currently. The final standings saw Rondebosch in first place, followed by Parklands High School and the University of Cape Town in second and third respectively. 

If CS:GO was where the high schools shined, FIFA 22 was dominated by universities with many students from Stellenbosch University, the University of Cape Town, UNISA, Cape Peninsula University of Technology and the University of the Western Cape occupying the bracket. The Student Showdown saw Zemaine Janza from Somerset Mall’s FIFA 22 top eight come first representing UNISA. UCT’s esports committee member Siyabulela Ntuntwana came second, and in third place was CPUT’s Nhlanhla Tebekwana.

Clash Royale saw SCHOOLS 2nd Term Split winner Jacus Nel (PRG) coming second against Kaiden Wessels (UCT). Third place saw Jacques Theron (Stellies) sneaking in. 

Alongside the four tournaments saw the Redragon Keyboard Rebuild Race and POCO mobile phones on display. However, even with so many gamers no-one could top the current national best time of 2:53 for the Redragon Keyboard Rebuild Race.  

For many of the attending students this was their first time competing in a live setting, and their responses were overwhelmingly positive with many already asking when the next event would be.

We are in an exciting post-lockdown era for esports. The next series of tournaments on everyone’s mind is the SCHOOL and UNI league finals which both take place in the week of the 29th of August. This is followed by the last big event for the year for tertiary institution students with the USSA (University Sports South Africa) finals taking place at UCT on the 1st and 2nd of October.

You can find photos from the Student Showdown event in our Facebook photo album.

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