UNA to Host eSports Mane Event

Nov. 16, 2022

Michelle R. Eubanks , UNA, at meubanks@una.edu, 256.765.4392

FLORENCE, AL – In a first-of-its-kind event, the University of North Alabama will have the Mane Event, an eSports tournament that will include several University departments as well as hundreds of high school students from more than a dozen high schools from across North Alabama.

The event is set for Friday and Saturday, Nov. 18 and 19 in the Communications Building on the UNA campus. 

“We are tremendously excited about having local high school students on campus playing in a UNA-hosted eSports event,” said Mark Linder, a lecturer in Sport and Recreation Management and among those organizing the Mane Event. “Since the Atari 2600, I think video games have always been popular. However, with the recent boom in technology and worldwide connectivity, gaming has gained both participants and spectators from a sector of society to whom traditional sports do no appeal.” 

The Mane Event is, foremost, a way to showcase some of the region’s best and brightest high school students to UNA and all it has to offer academically as well as programmatically, Linder said. 

“Secondly, the UNA eSports program hopes to assist the local high schools in establishing and supporting their own eSports clubs and reaping the benefits of organized gaming at the high school level,” he said. 

Organized and executed by UNA students, Linder said the Mane Event will allow high school students “to witness the quality character and work ethic of our current students throughout the event.”

Further, the students will have an opportunity to watch the members of the UNA eSports team, or Rocket League, compete in a collegiate competition.

About The University of North Alabama

The University of North Alabama is an accredited, comprehensive regional state university offering undergraduate, graduate, and doctoral degree programs through the colleges of Arts, Sciences, and Engineering; the Sanders College of Business and Technology; Education and Human Sciences; and the Anderson College of Nursing and Health Professions. Occupying a 130-acre campus in a residential section of Florence, Alabama, UNA is located within a four-city area that also includes Muscle Shoals, Sheffield, and Tuscumbia. UNA Athletics, a renowned collegiate athletics program with seven (7) Division II National Championships, is now a proud member of NCAA Division I as part of the Atlantic Sun and United Athletic conferences. The University of North Alabama is an equal opportunity institution and does not discriminate in the admission policy on the basis of race, color, sex, religion, disability, age, or national origin. For more: una.edu and una.edu/unaworks/.