COLUMBUS, Ohio - Pace Esports' All-Women's VALORANT Blue Team ("Pace Blue") recently placed third in the first-ever VENOM LAN event in Columbus, Ohio. 
 
VENOM is the first all-fem, fem-identifying, and Nonbinary VALORANT tournament aimed at calling out sexism, misogyny, and toxicity in the esports space. Hosted by Vanguard Championship Series, The *gameHERs, and GameArena OSU, VENOM spanned three days, from July 15th-July 17th (the last two days being dedicated to the tournament). Five teams, all comprised of fem, fem-identifying, and nonbinary people showed up for a chance to take home part of the $3,000 prize pool.
 
The concept for VENOM started with EsportsGear's "I AM ESPORTS" apparel campaign. The phrase—which was originally posted on Twitter as an act of toxic masculinity—was then reclaimed by EsportsGear and used to empower marginalized peoples in the gaming industry.
 
Pace's participation in the tournament with their All-women's VALORANT team signals the program and university's stance against sexism and gender-based discrimination as long-standing issues in the esports industry. According to Pace's Director of Esports Jesse Bodony, "By providing competitive opportunities, support, and dedicated spaces to marginalized groups, we are taking concrete action towards creating a safer, more inclusive industry."
 
The VALORANT Blue team, consisting of student-athletes A. "avery39499" Avery, AJ "duckiee" Weiss, Amber "Reybreum" Salim, Angie "Ennderpearl" Starn, Casey "angelqtpie4ever" Ungarsohn, and Kayla "kayzooie" Reeves. started off strong in the round robin pool. 
 
They played four best-of-three matches, two of which were sweeps. Pace Blue won the first match against the Weird Sisters, 2-0 (13-1 / 13-0), and the second match against Clam Slam 2-0 ( 13-1 / 13-0 ). Against their third opponent—the Hex girls—Pace Blue met their match and lost 0-2 (12-14 / 7-13) in two very close games. The last match of Day 2 against Skye's Sisters also ended in a loss for Pace Blue 0-2 (1-13 / 0-13). 
 
The team fought hard through their last two matches of the tournament. The first match of the day was a semi-finals rematch against the Hex Girls. Despite losing 1-2 (13-6 / 9-13 / 15-17) in the semifinals, the matches were extremely close, which ended in a quadruple overtime in game three. The last match of the tournament, Pace Blue won by a 2-0 (13-0 / 13-0) landslide against Clam Slam, securing third place overall in the tournament.
 
Pace will continue to uplift marginalized groups in esports by participating in competitive opportunities like VENOM, supporting marginalized peoples in pursuing leadership opportunities, and promoting the overall growth of safer, more inclusive esports communities.