Blizzard Entertainment is growing its collegiate esports programs across Overwatch, Heroes of the Storm, Hearthstone, StarCraft II, World of Warcraft and Rocket League. Over the past four years, Tespa has grown from four to 220 student communities across campuses in the United States and Canada. During the 2017 and 2018 school year, there will be over $1 million in college scholarships awarded through Tespa league tournaments.

Adam Rosen and Tyler Rosen, co-founders of Tespa and program managers at Blizzard Entertainment, told AListDaily that while there are over 65,000 student members, that number is about to grow.

“Historically, in order to participate, you had to go to a university or through a league, but that didn’t work for players who didn’t have campus chapters, so now anyone can go online and register to become a member,” Tyler said.

“Every college student in North America—regardless of their school’s Tespa chapter status—can become a member,” Adam added. He also extolled the benefits of Tespa Plus, a paid, premium membership.

Tespa is launching the online hub Tespa University, which will outline the local chapters and opportunities for students to get involved in college esports. This hub will also host six weekly esports broadcasts as part of a regularly scheduled programming push by the organization that will include spring and fall seasons.

The Rosens said this infrastructure focus will replace past one-off events and connect esports with these communities in much the same way college basketball and football do.

“There will be a season and offseason like football or basketball, so that when universities are looking at esports there’s a consistent schedule and it’s predictable and the formats will be the same,” Tyler explained.

This will also open up new opportunities for brands interested in connecting with college esports fans. Adam said the Tespa audience mirrors the overall collegiate demographic, although 70 percent of Tespa’s audience are STEM majors in college.

“For students who are playing or watching these competitions, it’s very much a social experience,” Tyler said. “Students are engaging with esports in their spare time, so it’s best for brands to approach them in a natural way.”

Tespa has had a strong partnership with SteelSeries, which provided keyboards, headsets and gear to its chapters. There was also an integrated media component to this sponsorship, where the SteelSeries brand was integrated into the media pieces in the Tespa broadcasts.

“We’re seeing a lot of interest from brands across the board, which is exciting to the communities and universities already involved,” Tyler said. “Brands are looking at ways to be integrated into the program.”

Adam added that college, in general, is a formative time for students to learn about and align with different lifestyle or esports brands. “As we open membership and become more public, we’re creating that pathway for brands to come in naturally and interact and engage directly with students.”

There’s also a new broadcast push this year to cover the six collegiate leagues, which also opens up new brand marketing opportunities.

“Through each of our broadcasts we can do custom segments and lower thirds and product placements just like with traditional college sports,” Tyler said. “We’re really doubling down on broadcasts this year on the Tespa Channel and see college esports competition through these leagues six nights a week.”

Adam believes college esports are more accessible than traditional professional esports because of the college affiliations—when Heroes of the Dorm aired matches on ESPN, they saw new fans hooked into rivalries like Michigan and Ohio State.

Trying to connect new fans with professional esports rivalries like Cloud9 against Immortals could be more challenging. But there will be new ways to connect pro esports with collegiate, especially with the upcoming Overwatch League that Activision Blizzard is launching.

“While the Overwatch League is officially disconnected from Tespa, it does offer a vibrant ecosystem in which collegiate esports plays an interesting angle,” Adam said. “Collegiate esports will be a great place to discover talent. It will also be interesting way for pro players to go back to college and continue to participate. We believe in the same things as the Overwatch League in that the local fan bases are important.”