Earlier this week, a Pac-12 statement included a section on the organization approving initiating an esports competition of its own. As the Pac-12 is one of the most notable collegiate leagues in North America, this is an incredibly big step for the industry.

But what would an officially sanctioned collegiate esports tournament actually look like? There’s lots of complications that come with being official.

Upending the status quo

The first big problem is that there already are many collegiate tournaments. There are ones run by developers (Heroes of the Dorm, uLoL), and ones run by third parties (CSL, many others). Many of them offer scholarships and competition with other schools not only around North America, but around the world.

A Pac-12 tournament could potentially throw a huge wrench in all of this. A school officially sponsoring a team, to play in a specific tournament, could also mean preventing the team from competing in any others. Just imagine an NCAA football team spending the offseason playing in a tournament with prizes in the form of scholarships and sponsored equipment.

If you can’t, you’re on the right track. The NCAA actually has super-strict regulations on what players can do when not competing officially, outlined below:

Impermissible Actions Following Initial Full-Time Collegiate Enrollment

Use of Athletics Skill for Pay

Acceptance of a Promise of Pay

Receipt of salary, gratuity, or compensation related to participation in athletics or athletics ability

Receipt of any division or split of surplus funds

Contract to play Professional Athletics

Receipt of Funds from a Professional team

Agreement with or Benefits from an Agent

While not guaranteed, it’s easy to see arguments that the NCAA could use to make players ineligible for common esports activities, such as streaming or receiving donations. Also notable is the following rule:

[perfectpullquote align=”full” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]“A student-athlete becomes ineligible for intercollegiate competition in his or her sport if, after enrollment in college and during any year in which the student-athlete is a member of an intercollegiate squad or team, he or she competes or has competed as a member of any outside team in any non-collegiate, amateur competition (e.g., tournament play, exhibition games or other activity) during the institution’s intercollegiate season in the sport.”[/perfectpullquote]

This would make all official collegiate esports players completely ineligible for any number of community tournaments, as long as the official tournament is ongoing, even if they are competing just as an individual. The lesson is clear—making collegiate esports official will definitely mess up the current status quo of developer and third party collegiate tournaments.

Student-athlete status

There’s also the limitations created in an esports player becoming an official student-athlete. There are many regulations that govern the activities of student-athletes, and the actions others can take on their behalf.

For example, at Cal, there are many limitations on activities, such as providing the use of transportation, providing a ticket to an event, and even “giving any type of gift or money.” These rules are significant, and only work with the collegiate infrastructure built around supporting collegiate athletes. There is no guarantee that this infrastructure would accept esports players.

Additionally, there are notable significant gambling-related activities that student-athletes are prevented from. This includes any form of betting or wagering “on any intercollegiate competition for any item (e.g., cash, clothing, dinner) that has tangible value.” If colleges are recognizing esports as sports, then something as simple as betting skins on a CS:GO match, or even participating in a money Fantasy LCS league would be prohibited. Per Cal:

[perfectpullquote align=”full” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]“We explain that activities, including such things as NCAA basketball tournament bracket pools and even fantasy leagues that have a monetary pay out, are considered gambling by the NCAA.”[/perfectpullquote]

Basically, there would have to be a complete re-evaluation of normal, common esports activities with these regulations in mind, before any of these collegiate athletes would feel safe to take them. And the penalty for breaking these rules often includes significant ineligibility rules, sometimes for a year or more.

Title IX Compliance

Finally, there’s the issue of Title IX compliance. Title IX is a federal law from 1972 that essentially states:

[perfectpullquote align=”full” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]“No person in the United States shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, or be subjected to discrimination under any education program or activity receiving federal financial assistance.”[/perfectpullquote]

TLDR: Universities need to spend equally on male and female athletic programs. The effect on collegiate athletics was significant—per Wikipedia: “Between 1981 and 1999, university athletic departments cut 171 men’s wrestling teams, 84 men’s tennis teams, 56 men’s gymnastics teams, 27 men’s track teams, and 25 men’s swimming teams.”

The obvious issue for esports is that, while spectatorship and casual play is relatively balanced and open, actual participation in even semi-pro events is almost exclusively male. The addition of a male-dominated athletics program, under Title IX, can only come in hand with one of two things—cutting another male program, or adding a female one. There’s been no real communication to address Title IX in Pac-12’s announcement, though it’s sure to come up as the plan gets acted on.

[perfectpullquote align=”right” cite=”” link=”” color=”” class=”” size=””]Collegiate esports has been and continues to be male dominated.[/perfectpullquote]

To date, collegiate esports has gotten away with ignoring Title IX, primarily because the competitions were all hosted by non-educational groups. But that’s all about to change, and I suspect there will be a significant blow-back against giving “gamers” athletic funds over other programs.

But also notable is that, to date, collegiate esports has been and continues to be male dominated. Columbia College, for example, has signed three esports players—all male. The University of Pikeville has 12 esports student-athletes, and 4 coaches. Again, all male. Maryville University has a League of Legends team… that’s just dudes.

And Robert Morris University, one of the first to implement an esports program? They have five different esports teams now, in League, Dota 2, Hearthstone, CS, and Heroes of the Storm. Of the many players listed, there are only two names that are not immediately recognizable as male. And the two female players the school identified two years ago during its initial tryouts are no longer with the program.

Now is the time to step back and recognize that this needs to change, or at the very least be addressed. Expanding male athletic programs, which they will be defined as without actual female participation, is a violation of Title IX without equal expansions in female athletic programs. It’s not good enough to simply say that women are eligible to compete, but “they don’t want to,” or “they didn’t make the cut.” They have to actually participate.

Where do we go from here?

This may, of course, lead to gender segregated programs within collegiate esports. The only real other alternative is to find a way to get females to participate alongside their male counterparts, an issue that the esports industry hasn’t yet solved satisfactorily.

But combined with the aforementioned issues of student-athlete regulations and interplay with existing collegiate tournaments, the move into officially recognized and university-sponsored esports tournaments is going to be a rough one.