Maryville University of Saint Louis has been disqualified from the League of Legends North American Collegiate Championship (NACC) qualifier for allegedly using a player who wasn’t enrolled in a university.
The team used former Final Five marksman Marko “Prototype” Sosnicki as its AD carry in yesterday’s matches versus the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (UIUC.) Apparently tournament organizer WellPlayed did not consider Sosnicki to be a full-time student—one of Riot’s requirements for playing in the Collegiate Championship.
But according to Maryville’s director of esports, Dan “Clerkie” Clerke, Sonsnicki is enrolled full-time for the upcoming Spring semester and is counted as a full-time student for this year, as well. Sonsnicki is not attending classes this semester, though he will in the spring (which is when the NACC tournament takes place.)
The rule simply states that “players must be currently enrolled and in academic good standing as either (a) full time student, as classified by the institution, or (b) a part time student that whose previous semester was enrolled as a full time student, as defined by the respective institution. Players must additionally be eligible to participate in school sanctioned club or competitive sports, as defined by the respective institution.”
Clerke also says that he plans on speaking with WellPlayed. He says the organization didn’t discuss the decision with him before it was made.
No matter how that conversation goes, Maryville’s fate may already be sealed, however. WellPlayed has updated its brackets to reflect the disqualification. In its place will be UIUC—who it defeated yesterday—which will face Purdue University tonight at 7pm ET/4pm PT.
WellPlayed did not respond to a request for comment on this article.
Image via Riot Games | Remix by Jacob Wolf