The NFL Field The Future event surprised Sunset Mountain High School
Receiving their own Super Bowl experience, the NFL Field The Future Event was held at Sunrise Mountain High School on Tuesday, providing the school with a brand new esports gaming lounge. The Las Vegas Raiders, EA Sports, and Xbox collaborated with the high school to provide over twelve PC and Xbox Series X consoles.
Raiders Chief Sales Officer Qiava Martinez had the honors to cut the NFL Field The Future Event ribbon for the Sunset Mountain High School’s new gaming lounge. Earlier this week, the school’s football head coach Chris Sawyers was also gifted two tickets to the Super Bowl.
“I’m just surprised with how [much] the room has changed,” said Luis Rodriguez, a sophomore at Sunset Mountain. “They talked about custom controllers, but I didn’t think they were going to customize the Xbox’s either. It’s a big upgrade from what we had before with the monitors and the equipment. It’s really nice.”
The highlight of the day was when Raiders edge rusher Maxx Crosby took the field to lead a student on-field combine. Students ran three-cone shuttle runs and a 40-yard dash while Crosby helped with the drills. As though they were actual players in the video game, their results were translated into their own Madden rating.
“The most important thing to me is showing up every single day and showing these kids I wasn’t a five-star dude, I didn’t just fall into a position where I was on a professional team,” said Crosby. “It literally started with the work every single day. I put my best foot forward and try to improve, but it took years to get to this level and I’m still looking for improvement. I know I can still get better. That’s my message that I share with these kids.”
After the NFL Field The Future Event combine, Crosby lingered to snap photos with students in front of the redesigned EA Sports Madden Cruiser, which pays tribute to the late Raiders head coach John Madden from 1969 to 1978.