Esports

In honor of his 90th Birthday, Father O’Mara was presented with a proclamation from the City of Chicago Heights at an all-school Mass, where faculty, staff, and students recognized his impact on the community, especially his 18 years of service as Chaplain at Marian Catholic! The celebration continued at a men’s basketball game where Fr. O’Mara served as an honorary Assistant Coach for the team and helped lead them to a 40-39 victory over DePaul Prep!

Matthew Jenkins '24 is on a mission to help others! He was recently featured on Chicago’s ABC7 News for creating his own group, Matthew’s Motivational Projects for Humanity. Matthew has already surpassed his original mission to collect 10,000 pairs of shoes for Soles4Souls, with over 12,000 donated!

Esports is in a League of Its Own

Following the lead of colleges like Purdue, Ohio State, UCLA, and Rutgers, esports made its debut at Marian Catholic last fall! Esports, or electronic sports, takes the form of organized, multiplayer video game competitions between opponents. With the help of Coach Mike Carlson '91, players perfect their skills alongside teammates. The students run drills, develop strategy, review game footage, and compete against other teams.

Marian Catholic plays in Illinois High School Esports Association tournaments (IHSEA), along with other high schools from across the state. IHSEA offers students the opportunity to play in three seasons with six different games including Overwatch, Rocket League, League of Legends, Super Smash Bros., Fortnite, and Valorant. In its inaugural year at Marian Catholic, over 51 students participated on ten different esports teams.

A grant enabled Marian Catholic to purchase state-of-the-art equipment for the esports lab. Students practice and play on 23 Alienware Aurora r12 Gaming Desktops and 23 27-inch ASUS Gaming Monitors.

Esports has been an incredible addition to Marian Catholic. “There are many advantages in having esports at Marian Catholic, including teamwork and collaboration, which plays a very important role leading to long-lasting friendships. Some of those friendships are also made with students from other schools that our students compete against,” said Mr. Carlson. Esports promotes teamwork, collaboration, structure, interpersonal communication, STEM and technical skill development, and even marketing, video production, and business skills. In the United States, over 600 colleges and universities have added varsity esports teams and/or scholarships for esports. Marian Catholic is already ahead of the game, by offering competitive gaming at the high school level.