Your Challengers Have Arrived: 2016 NA CS Spring Playoffs
It’s the time of the year where Challengers rise up -- fighting for the 2016 Spring Challenger Championship crown and the all important two Challenger spots in the Promotion Tournament for the NA LCS.
They’re a mixture of up-and-coming talent, the future of professional League of Legends, and former pro players who have already carved out their own piece of LCS history. We've reviewed each team and we selected a mix of new and familiar players for a closer look heading into 2016 NA CS Spring Playoffs.
North America, these are your Challengers…
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Apex Gaming - #1 (11pts, 3W-0L-2T)
Apex Gaming (APX) are the 1st seed heading into Playoffs. If the team isn’t familiar to you, it should be. The roster boasts former LCS players Keane, Cris, Xpecial, and Head Coach, Saintvicious. While Apex Gaming are the number 1 team heading into Playoffs, they are not without faults. Wins are carried on the back of their individual skill while their losses can be boiled down to occasional lapses of coordination.
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Police, ADC
A new face to North America, Hyeong-gi “Police” Park is known from his time on the South Korean Challenger team, ESC Ever. Ever became known for beating SK Telecom T1 in the KeSPA Cup and winning IEM Cologne but Police wasn't a part of those victories. He watched from Loken’s shadow as his team wrote their names into history. The last time Police played on Ever was when they failed their promotion bid into the LCK. Now, he has a second shot at qualifying for a major regional league with Apex.
This split, Police has been the typical “safe” AD Carry. Despite being on the #1 team his laning phase is below average with -0.8 CSD @10 and boasts the lowest Damage Per Minute of ADCs at 367. However, he holds the highest First Blood participation (60%), 2nd highest Kill Participation (78%), and highest KDA (6.6) for his role. The Korean AD Carry needs to earn his promotion if he wants to hang with the other solid performing ADCs of the LCS. While he isn't pulling his weight in damage, he always arrives at the scene of the crime to ensure the bad guys don’t get away.
While Police speaks limited English, he relies on Keane to translate on his behalf. Apex Support Xpecial confirmed that multiple languages among the team isn’t a problem in-game due to Keane’s translating. Xpecial believes it’s only an issue out of game, when trying to bond as a team, explain complex concepts, or give feedback or criticism. One thing that’s not lost in translation is Police’s ability to play a brutal bot lane with Xpecial.
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Xpecial, Support
Any veteran fan of the NA LCS will immediately recognize Alex “Xpecial” Chu from his time on TSM and Team Liquid. Negative speculation bubbled to the surface about his lack of drive and skill, which has only pushed Xpecial to practice even harder. He now focuses on becoming more proactive as a team leader and primary shotcaller.
“You aren’t born a shotcaller,” said Xpecial. “On my previous teams (TSM and TL), I was mainly a backup and doing 40-60% of the calls, now I do 80% of the calls now and review all of them.”
Xpecial is 1st in wards placed per minute for starting supports the NA CS at 1.30. He also has the highest first blood participation for supports at 67%, though securing those first kills isn’t the problem -- it’s what to do with them afterwards. Xpecial is Apex Gaming’s playmaker and it falls on him to lead his team and properly snowball those advantages that the team creates. So far they’ve made it look easy, but as the team meets tougher and more seasoned resistance, Xpecial is the veteran that Apex will have to look toward for guidance.
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Team Liquid Academy - #4 (5pts, 1W-2L-2T)
Team Liquid Academy (TLA) previously shared a roster with their sister NA LCS team, Liquid. Dardoch and Matt both got their start on TLA before moving up to the LCS Spring Split, which left TLA struggling to find success with their replacements Smoothie and eventually Akaadian.
Coming into the season if you had asked me who would win Challenger, I would've said TLA. A team full of friends with synergy you could only dream about, this team dismantled the competition to make it into the NA CS. They would have been shoo-ins for the NA LCS, but as Matt and Dardoch were desperately needed for the LCS squad, they now look like a shell of their former selves. If they are going to put a stamp on the CS Championship then they are going to rely on the great teleport timing and team play of Zig as well as the insane plays from the gatekeeper Fabbbyyy.
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Fabbbyyy, ADC
A former Solo Queue star and self proclaimed “Best Vayne NA”, Jovani "Fabbbyyy" Guillen rose to popularity from streaming and was known as “The Gatekeeper” among players hoping to turn “Diamond I” into “Challenger.” By the end of 2015, Fabbbyyy decided to take the game more seriously and pursued a competitive career with TLA. The talented, aggressive ADC is one of the best players in NA CS.
Fabbbyyy is number 1 in the league in kills at 47 (11 more than the next highest) and has the largest Gold differential at 10 minutes in the entire league for AD Carries. While Fabbbyyy is incredibly consistent, the problem he experiences on TLA is that he is now the only person on the team considered a threat. With Dardoch out of the picture and Youngbin in a bit of a slump, enemy teams can just single out Fabbbyyy by picking tanks that keep him at bay as the rest of his team is slaughtered.
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Zig, Top
Derek “Zig” Shao has been competing in League of Legends for years. Back in 2012, he reached the quarterfinals of the Season 2 North American World Championship Qualifiers as an ADC on Team Dynamic. Fast forward to 2015, he role swapped to top lane in an incredibly smooth transition. The veteran player helped the Robert Morris University team to second place at the 2015 North American Collegiate Championship (NACC) alongside his current midlaner, Youngbin, and now finds himself in the North American Challenger Series playoffs. One of his stand out plays this season was an unexpected hook on Seraph.
Even in the recovering state of TLA, Zig remains a workhorse. He’s tied for highest first blood participation for top laners at 50% and averages the highest Gold differential at 10 minutes for his role. With all of the early advantages you see in their statistics, one would think that TLA are better than their 4th place finish implies. But the team lacks clear leadership, and with that very apparent issue they continue to struggle with figuring out their plan for the mid- and late-game.
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Ember - #2 (10pts, 3W-1L-1T)
With Ember’s roster and support staff, it would be easy to confuse them for an LCS team. Ember (MBR) only dropped one game in the final four weeks of regular season play and added even more LCS firepower with Santorin, who played for TSM last year and most recently, European Challenger team Huma.
Ember holds the 2nd place seed but looks like the number one team coming into playoffs. With the addition of Santorin to the roster, Ember now has a suitable replacement for their star jungler Contractz. The organization has invested heavily into their infrastructure and have all of the tools you would expect of an NA LCS team and then some. Ember doesn't just have individual skill from some relatively unknown talent, they have players that are hungry and work together as a team for a unified goal: to make the NA LCS.
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Goldenglue, Mid
Greyson "Goldenglue" Gilmer played with Team 8 before joining Ember in the offseason and occasionally filling in on Echo Fox in the LCS this year. Now, he’s focused on becoming the primary shotcaller and being more of a team leader. Based on his time in the LCS, Goldenglue finds it’s hard to rank all the mid laners in NA but he’s confident that he knows where he would stack up against his peers.
“Every player has different strength and weaknesses but I feel that overall I am (or would be) a top 5 mid laner in NA LCS and the best mid laner in NACS,” said Goldenglue.
As much as it shocked me when I heard it, the numbers back him up. Among NA CS Mid Laners, he is 1st in KDA (6.5) and Kill Participation (74%). He is aggressive in lane and the combination of his roaming and pick potential puts Goldenglue over many of his peers. As to whether he is top 5 in North America at large? He might just be able to prove that next split.
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Stunt, Support
William "Stunt" Chen used to main all roles at a Challenger level so he credits his game knowledge as his biggest strength. He loves playing off-meta supports, let’s hope we can see one of these niche picks in Playoffs. He most recently played on Astral Authority before joining Ember. He’s also played on the LCS stage as a sub for Echo Fox. Stunt knows he’s good and he’s got the stats to back it up.
“From a statistical standpoint, I outperformed the other supports in NACS. I boast the highest KDA, kill participation, and assists in the league,” said Stunt. He’s number 1 in KDA at 5.7, Kill Participation at 81.1%, and Assists at 83, while only playing in 8 out of the 10 games for the team.
And despite having all of these great statistics that can create an ego, Stunt has shown nothing but dedication when it comes to his team. Ember needed a new starter to replace Gleeb. They needed a good player, that would mix well with the team, and available NOW! Young and taking a risk by delaying school to chase his dream, Stunt has since bolstered the ranks of Ember as the best “diamond in the rough” pick up this NA CS split.
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Team Dragon Knights - #3 (6pts, 1W-1L-3T)
Former LCS squad Team Dragon Knights (TDK) recently underwent a massive roster shake-up, trading players with Renegades. Alex Ich, Flaresz, and RF Legendary have all joined the TDK lineup alongside a new support player Trance while TDK traded away Top Laner Seraph and Mid Laner Ninja. Though Jungler Kez and AD Carry Ohq remain uncontested on the roster, the TDK starting lineup is up in the air.
TDK came into 2016 with a ton of hype around their roster: Former Top Laner Seraph had always pulled multiple bans and often carried games singlehandedly while high-profile ADC acquisition Ohq had shown tons of promise in the LCK. As TDK approached the season, their goal was to take first place without dropping a single game.
However, the 2016 Challenger Series was not nearly as successful as TDK fans and players hoped. Now, with Seraph entirely off the roster, their pre-playoffs lineup changes are borderline desperate. TDK traded one of their strongest points for strength in other positions and what could be their third Mid Laner in 11 games. The growth required for this team is massive, especially considering their first round opponents Ember are the most coordinated in all of challenger.
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Kez, Jungle
The LCS isn’t a new place for Kevin "Kez" Jeon. Kez was a key part of the “80 minutes the dream” aka the 2014 match of Complexity vs. Curse, which holds the record for the longest LCS game of all time. He’s the cornerstone of TDK shot calling, even more so now that the team is no longer all-Korean.
Kez is staying true to his history as a vision first, gank later jungler. He leads his role in Average Wards Per Minute at 1.02 and is in 2nd in the entire league at Average Wards Cleared per minute with .69, only .01 away from the leader Eve. However, Kez leaves much to be desired in his map activity outside of throwing down and clearing out those knowledge sticks. His Gold differential at 10 minutes is the 2nd lowest for junglers and has the lowest kill participation of all playoff junglers. What Kez does early is not very impressive, but you know what you're going to get when he's in the game -- consistent vision control. And as evidenced by his old LCS matches, he knows how to stall a game like no other.
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Ohq, ADC
Gyu-Min “Ohq” Oh previously played with LCK’s Xenics and NaJin organizations. He has a lot of good memories with his former teammates but was every excited about coming to North America and joining a team. The fact that it was formed with other Koreans and Korean-Americans made the adjustment to a new culture and environment much easier for him. When he joined the NA Challenger scene, he knew people had high expectations for him and recognizes that he needs to work harder to meet those expectations, but when it comes to entertainment he never disappoints.
When asked about the phrase associated with his playstyle of going hard for no reason he said he was flattered by them being called “Ohq moments.” He likes to 1v1 and split push. He feels he has more of a top laner mentality and even considered switching to the top lane but he wants to be remembered “as an incredibly good ADC.” And he is.
For ADCs, Ohq is number one in CS per minute, kill participation, and damage per minute. Additionally, he leads the entire league in CSD at 10 minutes, averaging a lead of 11.4 above his opponent. Not only is Ohq the most dominant laner in the entire league, he is the most dominant laner in the entire league with a freshly converted support. The question remains if the team will run their newly acquired support Trance (formerly of 6th place Enemy), or if they'll stick with Bischu moving forward. But regardless of which support TDK runs, and despite “Ohq moments” being a thing, he has already proven to be the face of consistency in the bottom lane.
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Want to learn more about the 2016 NA CS players and teams? Check out the NA CS player profiles and full rosters. For more information on NA CS Spring Playoffs, head on over to the event primer.
Tune in to the start of NA CS Playoffs when Ember takes on Team Dragon Knights on Tuesday, March 8 at 6PM PT.
