Who doesn't love an underdog when it comes to sports? It's in our nature to rally behind up-and-comers, who are usually a scrappy band of players that happen to get it together just in time for the crunch; and it is in their race for glory that we often see a little bit of ourselves. This year, one of the most "underdoggy" stories would be that of NYU's CSL team, which only entered competition in Season 4 with a minimum of four players, managing to collectively fight their way into the playoffs. Being a New Yorker myself, I was eager to get in touch with the guys and see what they had to say before the madness begins for them this Sunday.

How is the NYU team collectively feeling about the playoffs? Excited? Nervous? Ready to crush skulls?

We're pretty excited since we made it to the playoffs in our first season of CSL. On the other hand, it's kind of nerve-wracking to see such big names in our conference. Hoping for the best!

Give me an idea of what you consider the highlights of Season 4 for you guys so far. There were a lot of notable moments, but what were the ones that made you think "You know what, we have a real shot this season"?

We ended Round 5 of the season with a 1-4 record, and from that point on I pretty much lost hope in the playoffs being a possibility. However, after losing to McMaster, we had such an amazing winning streak that almost it made up for the horrible beginning. Around the closing of the season, Stony Brook University dropped out of the league, one of the schools we lost to, and that match turned into a win for us. It was then that I realized we still had a very, very slim shot of making the playoffs. The final three weeks were the toughest, because we were sixth in our division and every school we had to play was above us in the division.

Are there any teams you are looking forward to facing? Or, on the flip side, trying to avoid?

Personally, I want to face Dalhousie. They have quite a few characters on their team and have made quite a name for themselves. We played them early in the season while our team was still getting off the ground, and I feel like we've improved a lot. That's a tough scenario considering they're on the opposite side of the bracket from us. I could go on a tangent about how much I hated CSL's division system in the normal season because it didn't let me play against the schools that I wanted to, but that rant can be saved for another day.

What is training like for NYU? Do you meet up on campus to practice, lan-party style, or do you just congregate over the b.net servers with Skype or something?

NYU is really unaccommodating in that there's no easily accessible space for us to do LAN practice. We've been communicating purely through the internet, and it was even worse before chat channels came out so thank god for those. It's hard for us to schedule set practice hours especially since everyone's schedules are so different, but we make due.

Speaking of your campus, how is NYU receiving the e-sports scene so far? Is it picking up?

Aside from the Starcraft scene, I'm not aware of any other e-sports community within NYU. Our university recently opened up a "Game Center" which is trying to foster an e-sports scene within our school, and possibly in NYC. They recently reached out to us and expressed their interest in supporting our team, and first on that agenda was getting us a proper practice area for us. They'll be sponsoring our trip to the CES Invitational if we get accepted, so I'm super excited for that as well.

You'll be up against the University of Houston on Sunday the 27th. They have a few pretty top North American ladder players such as Trimaster and xiExO. I personally covered one of Trimaster's matches (ed. note: which can be read here) and know he's got some solid Terran strategies to watch out for. Originally the match up had you pitted against Wilfrid Laurier University, so how does this change make a difference (if any)?

On paper, University of Houston is much more intimidating than Wilfrid Laurier is. GoObuS and I, who are playing against ExO and Tri, are going to be practicing super hard for our games. We don't ladder much so our ladder ranks don't do us justice, but hopefully we'll be able to produce some solid games.

Any last thoughts for the fans out there before the playoffs begin? Speak now or forever hold your peace!

I don't think we've made a big enough splash in the collegiate scene to have fans, yet, but here's hoping that our dark horse story inspires other schools (especially those in NYC) to start their own teams. My team started out with only four players, the minimum required to handle the Bo5 format, and look where we are now in just our first season!

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Be sure to tune in this Sunday, March 27th for NYU vs. Univ. of Houston here at cstarleague.com!