National Capital Region and Luzon representatives came out as big winners, reigning supreme in four esports titles in the Dark League Studios’ inaugural Estudyante Esports National Championships over the weekend at the Ayala Malls Circuit in Makati.

De La Salle Green Aces were on target and gunned down Visayas qualifier Southwestern University-PHINMA Cobras with a 2-0 sweep to claim the Valorant title while Our Lady of Fatima University Quezon City Phoenix blanked University of San Agustin Eagles, 2-0, to also crown themselves as kings of the Summoner’s Rift in the League of Legends.

City College of Angeles, represented by Zaskiee, flaunted his mastery of Zafina to rule the Tekken 8 tournament and edge finalists from Far Eastern, Central Philippine University and University of Science and Technology of Southern Philippines.

Faith Colleges’ Novus Bravehearts of Batangas then pulled off a smashing Game 3 win to outlast University of Cebu Lapu-Lapu and Mandaue Thunder with a thrilling 2-1 in the centerpiece event Mobile Legends: Bang Bang.

DLSU, OLFU and Faith Colleges pocketed P500,000 each as City College of Angeles collected P100,000 for a whopping total of P1.6-million prize pool of Estudyante Esports, backed by the PBA, PLDT, Honda and Pocky, as part of the new program of Dark League Studios, which also organized the inaugural UAAP Esports last year.

“Palakpakan po natin lahat ng champions. Estudyante Esports is for the academe. It’s built to be a platform for students. It’s all about the students. The vision is to enable different schools in accepting esports into the industry,” said Dark League Studious co-founder and CEO AC Valdenor, joined by co-founder and chairman Bobby Rosales in the awarding ceremony.

The Bravehearts, who opened the series with a 20-12 Game 1 win, recovered from a second game hiccup with Zywin “Zywin God” Pedutem leading the charge.

Novus absorbed a 17-28 defeat as UCLM forced the decider but Zywin God along with CJ “SeaJay” Santos, Rojan “Shazz” Macasaet, Kirt Brainer “Kirttt” Trinidad and Ace King “ALASSS” Toledo, would not be denied with 26-8 Game 3 win.

Meanwhile, NAOS Esports star Xavier “Xavi8k” Juan stamped his class with a Finals MVP plum as he spearheaded the Aces composed of Lance Elmo “Banunu” Gacayan , Aaro Francis “Fission” Sablay, Fernando Miguel “Guelson” Dy (Guelson), Luis “Scnappi” Corpus and Lucas “Secre” Gruenberg in the two-game domination of the Cobras.  

La Salle showed mastery of the Lotus map in the first game with 13-9 win before putting up a much cleaner execution on the Pearl with a 13-6 triumph in the title-clinching Game 2.

Likewise, Phoenix displayed superb map control before banking on their late game power spike to draw first blood in the series with a 24-20 win in the over 37-minute Game 1 clash.

OLFU, led by Michael Jay “Austerity” along with Aiman “SCP 001” Guro, Karl Emmanuel “Nezu” Aviles, John Joseph “Swoof” Paracale, Van Michael “UC Van” Gestiada and Joshua “Mid Owa” Mendoza, showed no letup from there and capped the series with a resounding 35-14 win in Game 2.