Player Highlight: Lamp, Cornell College

Seth "Fatcat" Coggins 4/4/2025

Joe “Lamp” Wald is a member of the Cornell College Valorant team. I asked him about his experience in collegiate esports, and here’s what he had to say. “I’ve always been a competitive person, and I played soccer until I wasn’t able to anymore, but Valorant came out when I was in high school, So I started playing in the Minnesota high school esports league, which was super nice to keep that competitive spirit going. When I graduated and went to Cornell for my freshman year in the fall of 2023, I didn’t know at the time that they had a Valorant team, but once I found out I joined as a walk on, and I met the guys on the team that I would consider to be some of my best friends now.” I also asked him how he felt about playing in the MEC for a second year, “It's super great that each of the teams we go against feels a little more personal (in a good way). Ever since we first played against them in the fall of last year in this conference, Simpson has been a bit of a friendly rival of ours, and I play games with Banzai and Anomaly (From Simpson College) outside of playing against them in leagues, which is more than I can say for other leagues I’ve participated in. Additionally, the MEC has been nice since I feel like I’ve built an identity around it, and that we have a decently friendly relationship with the casters which I also appreciate greatly ” I then asked him if he had advice for anyone new or considering joining the MEC and he said “The MEC doesn’t have as many teams as NECC, so if you participate for multiple years, you start to know the teams you’ll play against pretty well, which is super nice for community building and friendly competition, so if you can, try and make friends.”

Rival to Watch

We then went back to the topic of his rival, to which he told me that he considers Simpson College a rival. “they are a pretty similar skill level to us and we have played against them nearly 20 times since my freshman year, and every single one of those games was heated in a friendly way, with Lend, kbull, and myself smack talking Anomaly, Siderz, and Banzai respectively”.

Watch more Valorant on the MEC stream at twitch.tv/unifiedlive and keep up with Lamp and the Cornell program on their competition page, @CornellEsports and @Lampp37 on X!