Many people on campus have not heard of the N.C. State club paintball team. Despite its obscurity, the club already has achieved a high level of success. In its first year as a recognized team at the University, it is already ranked in the national top 25.
The seven sharpshooters started competing in small Durham tournaments at Xtreme Kombat on Wake Forest Road.
“It’s a really nice field—the people are super nice and we’re also sponsored by Xtreme Kombat. So we try to play there as often as possible,” said Nicholas Isenhour, team captain and junior in mechanical engineering. “We also get to practice against ECU, and that helps us gauge where we are at as a team.”
Each field is about the size of a regulation football field. With five active shooters on each side, the main objective is to capture the opposing team’s flag from its base and hang it at your base.
The front players actively try to get the flag. The back players help their teammates by positioning them in optimal places for a greater chance to either shoot the other team or capture its flag.
This is also the team’s first year competing in the National Collegiate Paintball Association, the highest level in competitive collegiate paintball.
“We started to play together in Durham at Xtreme Kombat, and we got really good together,” Isenhour said. “We made it to the finals in every tournament we played there, so we decided to step it up to the NCPA.”
N.C. State’s Club Paintball has had a great deal of success during its first official season, consisting of one first-place finish, two third-place finishes, two fifth-place finishes and a seventh-place finish. The first- and third-place finishes came at the Xtreme Kombat tournaments in Durham.
Since stepping into the NCPA, the group decided to create two separate teams: a Class-A NCPA team eligible for national championships and a practice squad.
The team’s next tournament will be at the national championships April 19-21 in Lakeland, Fla. The tournament is one of the largest in the nation.
“Winning the national championship would mean that we are the best college paintball team in the nation,” said Isenhour. “We play for pride, so having that recognition and title would help grow our program, gain national recognition for N.C. State and get our team more recognition from the University as well.”
