SANTA ANA >> Cheers erupt from a small crowd sitting in the first four rows of folding chairs at the foot of the eSports Arena stage. Alex Kadela, a rising third-year student from Ryerson University in Toronto, explains that, against highly unlikely odds, a player from San Jose State had won a critical round in the National Collegiate eSports Association’s championship final in “Counter-Strike: Global Offensive.”

Not unlike the world traditional sports, this is called winning in the clutch.

“It can change the tide of the game completely,” Kadela said.

The tide continued to fall in favor of the five-player SJSU team, eventually clinching the CS:GO title after a five-game match against Laval University (Quebec) to claim the $5,000 first-place prize. The total $20,000 NCeSPA Grand Championship pot was split between the first, second and third place finishers in the CS:GO and League of Legends leagues.

The Spartans were one of seven collegiate eSports teams to converged on the 15,000-square foot venue in downtown Santa Ana on Saturday and Sunday. However, SJSU was the lone California representative in a field of seven teams that featured four Canadian schools: Ryerson, Laval, York University (Toronto) and the University of British Columbia.

Not even NCeSPA, the tournament’s governing body, has roots in Southern California. Long Nguyen, the organization’s founder and president, runs the organization from his home in Virginia while Daniel Roberts, the director of league operations, lives in Washington D.C.

So why travel all the way to Orange County for the event? It’s as simple as a lack of options.

“There aren’t a lot of places like eSports Arena around,” said Luke Brue, an account executive at eSports Arena.

The venue claims the title of the first dedicated eSports facility in North America, doubling as an event venue and a landing center for local gamers. It is equipped to host productions on par with ESL Gaming, a company that organizes events worldwide. Its various capabilities, from broadcast production to a warm-up area for players, are what drew NCeSPA to the otherwise nondescript warehouse on 5th street.

“We knew exactly what we were getting here,” Roberts said. “We watched events online that have been held here. We knew they’d have a solid setup.”

Roberts said the tournament operations were night and day compared to NCeSPA’s 2015 grand championships, which the small three-person team managed itself at the University of Maryland.

While it might seem odd that gamers from Kennesaw State University (Georgia) and the University of North Texas would need to travel to the West Coast for competition, beyond the fact that options other than makeshift setups in hotel conference rooms are limited, there is a reason an emerging business like eSports Arena would set up shop in the O.C.

“Southern California is a good home for eSports,” Brue said.

And he’s right. It’s home to Blizzard Entertainment, the developer behind blockbuster games like World of Warcraft and Diablo, which is headquartered in Irvine.

NCeSPA, which hosts competition for more than 100 schools in the U.S. and Canada between its two leagues, joined at least one other organization to bring its collegiate competition to the Santa Ana venue. Tespa West hosted a Collegiate Colosseum in early April, which also drew UBC as well as some local schools such as UC Irvine, which will launch a first-of-its-kind eSports initiative this coming fall that will include its own facilities.

While collegiate gaming is still a growing scene compared to professional competition, Brue said the event still drew a good-sized crowd.