Eight weeks of a regular season, playoffs, and pre-quarterfinals prepared junior Andy Trinh for his quarterfinal win on Wednesday. 

Next up for Trinh is the High School Esports League’s national semifinals on Sunday. 

“Esports to me, is a competition based on video games, but the thing about esports is [it’s] nostalgia and fun mixed together,” Trinh said. “The thing about video games is that I never started taking them to a competitive level until 9th grade, when I was in 9th grade I actually started to go to actual tournaments.”

As part of the year old Esports Club, Trinh has proven himself capable of going all the way according to club sponsor Chris Ham. 

“Andy’s always been a good player, we have smash tournaments in our school, and he helps run the tournaments sometimes and whenever he does play in our tournaments he usually wins,” Ham said. “So it’s not surprising that he made it this far, we’ll see if he can win it all.”

Such compliments on his game play have sparked a passion for Trinh that led him to take video gaming more serious. 

“Maybe when people started commenting on my playing, saying that I was good, maybe that could’ve been my motivation for going into competitive play,” Trinh said. “You want to maintain a competitive attitude or maintain your gameplay in any kind of game, just like playing football or baseball or any kind of sport.”

If Trinh wins the next two sets on Sunday, he will move onto finals, which take place from Dec. 16-20, giving way to more opportunities and growth for himself and the club. 

“There’s actually a lot of money out there, because Esports have a lot of sponsorships with different companies, so there is a lot of money to be had in the form of scholarships, so I’m hoping that our club can grow, we can really train our students to become good and competitive,” Ham said. “There’s collegiate level esports out there. I would love to see more students just really develop here at high school and get recruited to colleges. They can get full rides just like an athlete, just like any other sports. There’s a whole world out there for esports. I would really like to see us be more competitive and take advantage of what’s out there.”