Eleven Warriors

A new online experience for Ohio State fans to gather.

Our Challenge – Eleven Warriors asked Studio Elsa to transform a successful fan blog into a legitimate college sports news outlet and improve the overall user experience for Ohio State fans and the surrounding community.

Background – From fan blog to rehaul

Eleven Warriors was founded in 2006, by Jason Priestas, as a way for him to connect with Ohio State fans after leaving Ohio. The site grew from being a small personal project to supporting multiple contributors within a year, and by 2010 the site was in need of a rehaul, to accommodate the involvement of the community of fans, as well as the growing need for a fully realized mobile experience. A new responsive site was needed.

Process – A close collaborative with a clear vision

A collaborative project from the beginning, the project brought three distinct creative forces together: Studio Elsa, Eleven Warriors’ founder Jason Priestas, and Walt Keys, Eleven Warriors’ Creative Director and, Studio Elsa contributor. Jason has a background in tech, and had a clear vision of where the site needed to go. The Eleven Warriors team would be responsible for the build of the new site on Drupal, with Studio Elsa designing the user experience Ohio State fans would interact with on the site. Including information, user experience, and interface design as well as providing overall best practices and recommendation. Walt Keys would provide the art direction of the project, as well as brand graphics, and photography.

We did a review of the competitive landscape. SB Nation as a benchmark for what sports news sites could look like, and Polygon or its inventive design, and community involvement.

As Eleven Warriors entire team, are not only contributors to the site, but fans themselves, the discovery process was smooth. What we learned was easy to define, and translated into wireframes and user flows. See Below:

Eleven Warriors was founded in 2006, by Jason Priestas, as a way for him to connect with Ohio State fans after leaving Ohio. The site grew from being a small personal project to supporting multiple contributors within a year, and by 2010 the site was in need of a rehaul, to accommodate the involvement of the community of fans, as well as the growing need for a fully realized mobile experience. A new responsive site was needed.

Process – A close collaborative with a clear vision

A collaborative project from the beginning, the project brought three distinct creative forces together: Studio Elsa, Eleven Warriors’ founder Jason Priestas, and Walt Keys, Eleven Warriors’ Creative Director and, Studio Elsa contributor. Jason has a background in tech and had a clear vision of where the site needed to go. The Eleven Warriors team would be responsible for the build of the new site on Drupal, with Studio Elsa designing the user experience Ohio State fans would interact with on the site. Including information, user experience, and interface design as well as providing overall best practices and recommendation. Walt Keys would provide the art direction of the project, as well as brand graphics, and photography.

We did a review of the competitive landscape. SB Nation as a benchmark for what sports news sites could look like, and Polygon or its inventive design, and community involvement.

As Eleven Warriors entire team, are not only contributors to the site, but fans themselves, the discovery process was smooth. What we learned was easy to define, and translated into wireframes and user flows. See Below:

Solution – the fan at the center of the design

To better serve the community and its involvement the new site got user registration, forums, polls with comments, as well as a design that responded to every view point. And as we are always putting the human at the center of design our focus was to provide an overall improved user experience for Eleven Warrior’s audience.

The new look really legitimized us. We went from looking like a fan site to something that was professional, and I believe that absolutely helped in our growth and notoriety. There’s no doubt in my mind that the professional look legitimized us as a news outlet.

Studio Elsa were sharp, creative, flexible and really understood what we needed in this redesign, working hard to ensure the vision met reality.

Jason Priestas, Founder, Eleven Warriors

Visiting the site today, we are excited to see that the design is holding the test of time. Eleven Warriors, have maintained it well with some new enhancements. Still, seven years after the new site launch the site design is still very much relevant and functional. Have a look for yourself at Eleven Warriors.


I originally wrote this case study for studioelsa.se. A design and technology company I run with Jack Boberg, whereas I do most of my professional work these days.

My parts in this project: UX Design, Information Architecture, Art Direction, Interaction Design, and UI/UX.

Originally published at studioelsa.se – Eleven Warriors Website Case Study.