{"id":191818,"date":"2026-02-24T19:52:09","date_gmt":"2026-02-24T19:52:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/191818\/"},"modified":"2026-02-24T19:52:09","modified_gmt":"2026-02-24T19:52:09","slug":"fresno-states-growing-esports-program-championships-competition-community","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/191818\/","title":{"rendered":"Fresno State\u2019s Growing Esports Program: Championships, Competition, Community"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Fresno State\u2019s competitive gaming scene is continuing to grow, as Fresno State Esports builds on a string of national success while fostering a diverse and inclusive campus community.<\/p>\n<p>The university\u2019s eSports program operates as a club under the Associated Students, Inc. (ASI) and Student Involvement. Most of its teams participate in the National Esports Collegiate Conference, facing off against schools from across the United States and Canada.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Current-Games_Compressed.jpg\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wp-image-234341 size-full\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Current-Games_Compressed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1280\" height=\"720\"  \/><\/a>The Fresno State eSports program offers five games to students. In most of the teamplay, there are varsity and junior varsity skill levels.<\/p>\n<p>The program has already secured seven championships overall, including five within NECC competition, marking it as one of the university\u2019s most successful club sports. To qualify as a student-athlete, participants must be full-time Fresno State students and attend team tryouts.<\/p>\n<p>Beyond campus competition, Fresno State Esports also hosts community games, welcoming local players who are not enrolled at the university to participate and engage with the growing esports network.<\/p>\n<p>Fans can watch matches live on their Twitch <a href=\"https:\/\/www.twitch.tv\/fresnostatees\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">here<\/a>. To stay up with current updates and news, follow the team\u2019s Instagram page <a href=\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/fresnostatees\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener nofollow\">here<\/a>. Follow the links in their profile to join their Discord or watch them on Twitch.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-full wp-image-234343\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/02\/Twitch.TV_Compressed.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"1280\" height=\"720\"  \/><\/p>\n<p>Students describe the esports club as a reflection of Fresno\u2019s broader diversity, bringing together gamers from a wide range of backgrounds who share a common interest in competitive play.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWhen I think of Fresno, I think a lot of diversity. The club itself has a bunch of different people, people of all races, colors, you know, everyone kind of fits in.\u201d said League of Legends player Yicherpe \u201cEbay\u201d Vang.<\/p>\n<p>Team members say they support one another both in and out of competition \u2014 helping each other improve in-game rankings while building friendships along the way.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe all make time for each other to help each other rank up in games and just practice and practice. And then you get to know people on the way, which is great.\u201d said Marvel Rivals player Claudia\u00a0Fitzpatrick.<\/p>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Fresno State\u2019s competitive gaming scene is continuing to grow, as Fresno State Esports builds on a string of&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":191819,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31],"tags":[38696,112,114,113,742],"class_list":["post-191818","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-fresno","tag-esports","tag-fresno","tag-fresno-headlines","tag-fresno-news","tag-fresno-state"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191818","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=191818"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/191818\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/191819"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=191818"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=191818"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=191818"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}