As of the start of the Overwatch League 2023 preseason, only two teams had an official academy: the Seoul Dynasty with Gen.G Global Academy, and the San Francisco Shock and its partnership with Korean Contenders team O2 Blast. A majority of the league had academy teams, but all of them went inactive around the 2019 and 2020 seasons.
But now, one OWL team is bringing back a formerly inactive academy roster. The New York Excelsior confirmed the reformation of its academy team today. Dubbed the NYXL Academy, the roster will compete in both the Contenders scene and the Calling All Heroes scene, as a roster of marginalized gender players.
The roster consists of eight players, some relatively unknown in the competitive scene but others with experience and great results in late 2022 and early 2023. One of the notable pickups is support player Veronica “Wicca” Haggerty, who won both the Calling All Heroes Challengers Cup with Altiora Artemis in Dec. 2022 and the recent Open Division season in North America for team Hive earlier in Apr. 2023.
Another notable name is Bun, also known as Chloe. They were a part of the Altiora Artemis roster that won the Challengers Cup, but they have competed in Contenders across 2022 for The Milkmen. Asides from Bun, other former Contenders players like Cameron “kindred” Morrell and Stevie “sniper” Rivera help round out the roster.
This news marks the NYXL Academy as the third official academy roster currently in the Overwatch League. But in terms of a returning commitment to the tier-two scene, NYXL is the first for the NA scene. The San Francisco Shock has had two different academy rosters in the Contenders sphere, starting with NA team NRG Esports until 2019 and partnering with Korean team O2 Blast in early 2022.
Yet this NYXL Academy roster is a returning commitment from the NYXL organization to grow talent locally and develop them into the league, even if the name is different from its original academy team, XL2. They will compete in the upcoming Spring Series for NA Contenders, starting on April 24 and ending on June 10.
