Amateur esports team walks away with $50,000

On August 16th, esports team Triumph claimed the title of North American Regional Champions for the Call of Duty Challengers tournament – walking away with a respectable $50,000 in prize money. Making their way through the Winners Bracket, Triumph managed to come out on top against other amateur organizations like J4L, Forever Unlucky, Five Star, and Carnage.

Founded in 2019, Triumph (then known as Triumph Gaming) was initially created to break into the competitive Overwatch scene. But with the acquisition of a squad known as Main AWP, Triumph entered through its hat into the Counter-Strike: Global Offensive scene – and have even managed to secure NBA legend Kevin Garnett as an investor.

Since then, Triumph has gone on to recruit squads that now also compete in games such as Riot Games’ Valorant and, of course, Call of Duty. Including their recent victory in the CoD Challengers Tournament, Triumph will have three tournament wins under their belt for the season.

All eyes will be on them once the next season starts for the official Call of Duty League – the professionally recognized esports scene featuring well-known organizations like FaZe Clan and OpTic Gaming. More likely than not, Triumph’s commendable performance will land more than a few members in coveted openings for professionally recognized teams.

Call of Duty Challengers is, according to their website, “the official amateur competition for Call of Duty esports players around the globe, featuring a prize pool of over $1 Million.” So, while the organization itself isn’t considered “professional,” it is a common stepping-stone for those aspiring to get recruited by officially recognized esports teams – much in the same way traditional sports have minor leagues filled with future potential talent.

Hosting both online and LAN events, both audiences and recruiters regularly observe the leagues rankings in hopes of finding fresh talent. League players are ranked according to a “Challenger Points” system – whereby league participants are given different values of points based on performance and ranked accordingly.

Challengers isn’t limited to North America; tournaments are held all around the world, including Europe and the Asia-Pacific region, which also includes Oceana. According to tourney standings, Renegades took first for the APAC region while Team WaR came out as champions in Europe – taking home $15,000 and $40,000, respectively.