The Muskingum University Athletic Department has named Quinn O'Bryan as its first-ever esports head coach.

O'Bryan arrives in New Concord with a wealth of experience in esports. He has played in countless ESEA league tournaments in Counter-Strike Global Offensive on a semi-professional team and reached the highest rank possible in Counter-Strike Global Offensive that less than one percent of players achieve. O'Bryan is also active in numerous leagues for Counter-Strike, Overwatch, and League of Legends. Furthermore, O'Bryan performed analytics for Overwatch players to help them improve their gameplay and attended two world championship events (Counter-Strike, Rocket League).

"I'm happy to welcome Quinn to the Muskingum Athletics family," said Vice President and Athletic Director Steve Brockelbank. "I'm looking forward to Quinn building the foundation of the varsity esports program and positioning Muskingum as a top-notch competitor in the esports arena."

"I am very excited to be joining the Fighting Muskies," said O'Bryan. "I'm looking forward to establishing success through our esports team on the battlefield and in the classroom. I am ecstatic to be working with our future esports athletes and hope to provide them with all of the resources, coaching, and experience they need to thrive in school and in esports."

For the past two years, O'Bryan has worked at C-Forward as a system administrator in Covington, Kentucky. At C-Forward, O'Bryan helped provide rapid response to daily issues involving personal computers, network services, worked with third-party vendors to resolve software related problems, and addressed concerns across multiple platforms and locations. O'Bryan graduated from Northern Kentucky University in 2018 with a B.S. in business informatics.

Esports, which involves teams representing their institutions in competitive online gaming through multiplayer matches, will launch as a new varsity intercollegiate sport during the 2019-20 academic year. Muskingum is a member of the National Association of Collegiate Esports (NACE) and plans on competing in Leagues of Legends, Overwatch, and Rocket League. NACE is the only association of varsity esports programs at colleges and universities across the United States.