Name: Logan Koneczny, esports Rocket League team member
Hometown: Hermantown, Minn.
Year in school: Junior
Major: Computer networking and information technology
What is your experience level with Rocket League? I started playing video games competitively after I saved up from working my first job around the age of 16. I played Counterstrike Global Offensive for two years and was playing just under the semipro level. Around when I turned 18 I was beginning to bore of CSGO. I had Rocket league installed and played it here and there but never really focused on the game. I started to put more and more time into it and started participating in organized leagues to try and better myself against higher competition. I continued to do this through my senior year of high school and into my freshman year of college. I decided to set a goal to make a team and play for my college in Collegiate Rocket League.
What makes Rocket League a fun and challenging game? First, there is no game like it. Often with other games likes FPS (first-person shooter), you can be good just from the mechanics you learn in other games. This doesn’t apply to Rocket League, which makes learning new techniques and skills in the game more challenging but also more rewarding once you master them. Second, the Rocket League skill ceiling is very high, so you always have something to work and improve on. It’s a team-orientated game. You need to be able to rely on teammates to make touches or back you up on your mistakes, so being able to find a group of players that you mesh well with is challenging but rewarding in the end because often times you’ll make friends in the process.
What is your assessment of UW-Stout’s Rocket League team? Our team already competed (independently) in the biggest nationwide tournament Collegiate Rocket League offered and took the 19th seed out of 250 teams last spring. I think the biggest strength that the esports program has at Stout is the friendships players already have. This is going to make playing together and communication way easier and will speed up improvement of the players and teams.
How are you and teammates preparing for the season? I think this team is special, because outside of the game we are close friends, which helps us communicate and handle situations in the game. Alex Kotowski, Joey Messina and I have been communicating and playing in the offseason to prepare for the coming fall. We have been playing ranked games together against the top 2% of the game, as well as scrimmaging other colleges like Purdue and Cincinnati and doing very well. We also play the game on our own time and work on our mechanics and constituency in training.
What are your thoughts about UW-Stout starting esports? What excites me the most is the practices, the late nights playing with the team and the experiences we are going to share. From playing in tournaments and seeing our growth as a team, to just having fun playing and practicing as a group in the esports room, I really wouldn’t want to play with anyone else.
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