Matt Mathias 

Sports Editor 

mcm5909@psu.edu

On January 24, at 7:30pm, Ovilee May, Host at G4TV and  an Award-Winning Esports journalist, came to Penn State Behrend as part of the Spring 2022 Speaker Series. Ovilee May, was born and raised in California, and she works for Riot Games and Team Liquid. May’s visit was welcomed with open arms by the esports club here at Behrend. The team competes in the Eastern College Athletic Conference and is based in Perry Hall.

Esports has become quite the blossoming field. In 2021, esports as a whole generated more than $1 billion and gained viewership from all around the world. In the League of Legends World Championship Final last year, the event boasted nearly 74 million people spectating the event. It was broadcasted in 16 different languages and was hosted on 21 separate streaming platforms making it the most accessible global competition to date.

The Beacon had the pleasure of interviewing Ms. May while she was in Erie for the Speaker Series event. When asked about how she got her start in the industry, she recalled her first esports event that she attended when she was 16-years old. 

“I attended my first League of Legends event in Los Angeles, California. Just standing there in the middle of hundreds of fans watching people play a game professionally that I love was surreal,” May explained. “They played the best of the best from different areas around the world. The roar of the crowd, the smiles on peoples faces, the devastation when a fan’s team lost; it hit me straight in my core. I had no idea what I was going to do with esports, but I knew it was where I would find my home.”

May would have a long journey in reaching her dream of a career in esports, but she never let anything slow her down. Esports, much like its counterpart being mainstream sports, is a massively male dominated industry. When asked about being a groundbreaker in the field for women everywhere, she explained her successes.

“Many women have come before me as pioneers to make it a safer and more welcoming space. They’re the ones that have done the heavy lifting. You have all of these wonderful women who have done amazing work and have solidified their spots in the scene,” May said. She goes on to mention some of the toxic comments that people sometimes send her way being a woman in esports. However, she is confident that those toxic individuals are being drowned out by the majority involved. “These rude people are simply a very vocal, small minority of people. And while I think it’s great to take constructive criticism, there is nothing constructive besides hate in these instances.”

May has been an expert in the field for several years now. As somebody who understands the logistics of developing a successful league, she was asked which esports leagues that exist currently are the most successful and which are doomed to struggle.

“I think when you think of premiere esports leagues you think of the competitive League of Legends leagues as a whole. They are probably the most structured and well run tournaments in all of esports. I’m a little biased, but I think you would be hard pressed to find anybody that wouldn’t agree with saying that Riot Games laid out the blueprints. Right next to it, I would have to say CS:GO or Counter-Strike Global Offensive, does a fantastic job,” May continued. “However, the Overwatch League just absolutely shot themselves in the foot with this whole regionalizing system. Something that any esports fan can tell you is that there is almost no such thing as cheering for your home states team. The closest you can get is cheering for your region. So North America, Europe, China, Korea and so on. It just doesn’t follow a traditional formula. However, Overwatch League and Fortnite have done a great job of catching the general public’s eye and expanding the awareness of esports in a widespread fashion.”

To close out the interview, May was asked about the prospect of an all women’s league. Generally, women are not represented well in the professional sports scene. 

“When a womens league was recently announced, there was a lot of controversy. I think that the controversy itself stems from some misunderstandings or something that is overlooked. There are not a lot of women in the space and it is not because they are not good enough to play. Often what has happened is that women try to get their start in the competitive scene. Esports teams often have a team house of sorts where the team lives together, practices together, and so on. If a woman were to be a part of that living experience, that could make some of the men uncomfortable. That really sucks,” May relented.

“It could be coming from a place where it’s not sexist and without bigotry, just the feelings of some very young people. From there, it becomes the responsibility of the greater scene as a whole or the organizations to hold these tournaments or series’ where women, and people identifying as women, can compete so they can slowly start getting integrated into the scene. Creating these leagues for women is not taking away resources from the men. We just need to foster this female talent until we get to the point in the community and ecosystem where it is no longer needed.”