Coach Spotlight - Ryan Goeke

For Ryan Goeke, esports has always been about competition, community and finding ways to improve. Now, as the head esports coach at Hawkeye Community College, Goeke helps students develop both as competitors and as people. 

Goeke has been part of the Hawkeye esports program for five years. He joined the college as an assistant coach in fall 2020 before becoming head esports coach ahead of the fall 2021 season. Goeke’s interest in esports began long before he started coaching. He played video games throughout his childhood and first became interested in competitive esports when Call of Duty Elite launched for Modern Warfare 3. He participated in clan competitions through the service and encouraged his friends to compete alongside him. In 2013, Goeke built a PC and began playing League of Legends. Around the same time, he started following professional esports and watching the League of Legends Championship Series.

For Goeke, esports provides an opportunity to combine his interests with competition while also connecting with a larger community. 

“Esports are important to me because they are a way of expressing your interests and scratching a competitive itch at the same time,” said Goeke. “There’s also an amazing community around esports. I have been to a lot of major sporting events in my life, but by far the most electric of them were the 2019 LCS summer finals in St. Louis, and the Worlds 2022 semifinals in Atlanta- and at both of those events, I met a lot of cool people.”  

That passion has carried into Goeke’s coaching career at Hawkeye. One of the most rewarding parts of his role is helping the team solve problems, improve and see progress over time.

“Seeing the personal growth of our student athletes in esports over the course of the season is really rewarding.”  

Competition also comes with challenges. Goeke said dedicating significant time to esports can be difficult when a team falls short of its expectations. Despite those challenges, Goeke has already experienced success at Hawkeye. During his first year as an assistant coach, the program won the National Championship in Rainbow Six Siege. Goeke hopes to return to that level of success in the future, whether in Rainbow Six Siege or another title. 

Beyond competitive results, however, he wants to continue making Hawkeye’s esports arena a welcoming place for students. Goeke also sees the NJCAAE as an important part of the collegiate esports experience. Hawkeye has competed in the NJCAAE for many years, and Goeke said the league provides a structured competitive environment for two-year institutions.  

“Hawkeye has been in the NJCAAE for many years now, and it’s the best structured league we have competed in. It really is the only comparable competition to what 2 year institutions have in traditional sports. We look forward to competing in the NJCAAE for a long time,” said Goeke.

Goeke uses several approaches to recruit players. Hawkeye visits high schools that do not have esports teams and sits in on games and practices at schools that do. The program also attends state high school esports championships. 

Looking ahead to the upcoming year, Goeke hopes Hawkeye’s teams can build on what they learned last season.  

“I want our teams to outperform last year! We have a good amount of returners this year, so I’m hoping we will build on what we learned last year and do better this time around,” said Goeke.

Outside of esports, Goeke spends time with his wife and newborn son. He also plays League of Legends with friends, travels, reads, listens to records and plays disc golf. Goeke also hopes to see more people discover esports beyond playing video games themselves. 

“I would encourage anyone in the esports space to promote esports at large to anyone you can if you have the platform to do so. I have a lot of students who come into our program who have never watched a professional esports match. They’ve never been to a live esports event. They’ve never purchased a jersey, or cheered for a favorite esports team. With everything competing for your attention these days, it’s easy to have never done any of that despite enjoying video games. Encourage people to give it a shot and advocate for it,” said Goeke. “It might become their new favorite thing.”