As the summer heat rises, so does the excitement in the LCS with teams gearing up for the highly anticipated 2023 LCS Summer Split.
LCS action makes a delayed return in Summer as the scheduled June 1 start for the league was postponed for two weeks due to the LCSPA walkout and the negotiations between players and Riot. But both parties eventually came to an agreement, which means LCS returns with six consecutive superweeks.
On the teams’ side, we had a lot of roster changes in the off-season. Only three teams are coming into the Summer with their Spring rosters intact, and two of these are the MSI representatives. With this much change happening after a pretty inconsistent split for a lot of teams, it’s quite hard to know what to expect from most teams. Still, here are our predictions on how teams will finish in the standing at the end of the Summer Split.
10. TSM (Spring Finish: 7th)
- Top lane: Kevin “Hauntzer” Yarnell
- Jungle: Lee “Bugi” Seong-yeop
- Mid lane: Lee “Ruby” Sol-min
- AD Carry: Jason “WildTurtle” Tran
- Support: Jonathan “Chime” Pomponio
This is potentially the last split TSM will play in the LCS, so it’s nice to see them with some familiar faces like Hauntzer and Turtle. But it’s hard to find any upside to this team aside from one last hurrah for some fan favorites.
TSM’s seventh place finish in Spring was mainly due to Maple/Bugi duo, along with some teams underperforming. Now they lost Maple and replaced him with Ruby, who is coming off of two horrible splits on Heretics. There is still some hope to make the postseason since it’s an eight-team playoff, but it will be an uphill battle.
9. Immortals (Spring Finish: 9th)
- Top lane: Colin “Solo” Earnest
- Jungle: Shane Kenneth “Kenvi” Espinoza
- Mid lane: Onur Can “Bolulu” Demirol
- AD Carry: Edward “Tactical” Ra
- Support: Erik “Treatz” Wessén
Immortals made two changes for Summer, Treatz and Solo. While I think Treatz is an upgrade from Fleshy, if he is in form after his break, losing Revenge might hurt them. Despite being an inconsistent player, Revenge was a carry threat, unlike Solo who is more reliable but tends to stick to tanks.
Whether this roster makes it to playoffs will mostly depend on Tactical. If he can finally reach a level close to what was promised to fans when he first joined TL, Immortals can get some upsets here and there. But even in that best case scenario, it’s hard to imagine them rising above eighth place.
8. Dignitas (Spring Finish: 10th)
- Top lane: Lee “Rich” Jae-won
- Jungle: Lucas “Santorin” Tao Kilmer Larsen
- Mid lane: Nicolaj “Jensen” Jensen
- AD Carry: Frank “Tomo” Lam
- Support: David “Diamond” Bérubé
Hard to imagine Dignitas having a worse split than Spring. Since they brought in Tomo, they’ve been on a rising trajectory, although they started so low that it did not matter. Maybe if they can get a decent start in Summer, they might have a better regular split. They still have a lot of experience and talent in the roster, especially if they can get the Rich from V5 days and not NiP.
7. Evil Geniuses (Spring Finish: 4th)
- Top lane: Mo “Revenge” Kaddoura
- Jungle: Jonathan “Armao” Armao
- Mid lane: Joseph Joon “jojopyun” Pyun
- AD Carry: William “UNF0RGIVEN” Nieminen
- Support: Bill “Eyla” Nguyen
Well… That was a hell of an off-season for Evil Geniuses. They gave up on their two new signings after just one split and lost two more pieces from the championship roster. Losing Inspired will be especially hard as the former MVP was the best player of EG since he joined.
Still, not all hope is lost. Revenge, Armao and Eyla are all decent players. UNF0RGIVEN should’ve never played in the Academy and he is already a top half ADC. We even saw Jojopyun find himself again in a Korean bootcamp, reaching the top 10 Challenger in under a month. EG has a chance to prove us wrong, but they will need a lot to go their way.
6. Team Liquid (Spring Finish: 8th)
- Top lane: Park “Summit” Woo-tae
- Jungle: Hong “Pyosik” Chang-hyeon
- Mid lane: Harry “Haeri” Kang
- AD Carry: Sean “Yeon” Sung
- Support: Jo “CoreJJ” Yong-in
TL didn’t make any changes despite the disastrous Spring finish and giving another chance to their rookie carries. I think it is a good idea and I’m not expecting them to be as bad as they were last split, but it would be unrealistic to think they will go from bottom of the table to contenders.
For some good news, they had an EU bootcamp during MSI and apparently held their ground against international-level teams. So maybe there is still some hope.
5. 100 Thieves (Spring Finish: 6th)
- Top lane: Kim “Ssumday” Chan-ho
- Jungle: Can “Closer” Çelik
- Mid lane: Lim “Quid” Hyeon-seung
- AD Carry: Yiliang “Doublelift” Peng
- Support: Alan “Busio” Cwalina
Doesn’t matter how much criticism he got online due to his play, the impact of Bjergsen retiring on this squad will be felt. His replacement, Quid, is a decent LCK Challengers prospect, but the veteran mid laner was the loudest voice in 100T during Spring. They are also relying upon their top and jungle bouncing back from a bad split before they think about a deep playoff run. One saving grace for the Thieves is that the bot lane carry meta continues, and we saw how successful Doublelift was doing in a similar environment last split.
4. NRG (Spring Finish: 5th)
- Top lane: Niship “Dhokla” Doshi
- Jungle: Juan Arturo “Contractz” Garcia
- Mid lane: Cristian “Palafox” Palafox
- AD Carry: Victor “FBI” Huang
- Support: Lee “IgNar” Dong-geun
The most charming team in the LCS for the last year or so not only changed orgs but also replaced their bot lane. We know this top side trio is enough to crack the top of the standings, they were all All-Pro level in Spring despite getting snubbed. The bot lane change hurts for the fans, but it might be for the best. Luger and Poome were a bit inconsistent at times, and FBI has been great on a struggling EG. The big worry here is IgNar, who hasn’t been himself for years now but apparently FBI really wanted to play with him.
3. Golden Guardians (Spring Finish: 2nd)
- Top lane: Eric “Licorice” Ritchie
- Jungle: Kim “River” Dong-woo
- Mid lane: Kim “Gori” Tae-woo
- AD Carry: Trevor “Stixxay” Hayes
- Support: Choi “huhi” Jae-hyun
This is probably the first time in the organization’s history that Golden Guardians start any split in the top half of power rankings, but it would be unjustifiable not to do it after their Spring and MSI. Despite their obvious problems at MSI, the macro play, bot duo’s laning phase, etc., the Guardians were arguably the better LCS team in London. Considering their form and how well the team meshes together, they won’t repeat their Spring performance.
2. Cloud9 (Spring Finish: 1st)
- Top lane: Ibrahim “Fudge” Allami
- Jungle: Robert “Blaber” Huang
- Mid lane: Jang “EMENES” Min-soo
- AD Carry: Kim “Berserker” Min-cheol
- Support: Jesper “Zven” Svenningsen
Another tough international event for Cloud9. It always puts them in an awkward position as they dominate domestic competition, but struggle immensely against the Eastern teams. Thankfully for them, Summer Split is still a domestic competition and there is no reason to think they won’t be a top two team.
1. FlyQuest (Spring Finish: 3rd)
- Top lane: Jeong “Impact” Eon-young
- Jungle: Mingyi “Spica” Lu
- Mid lane: Lee “VicLa” Dae-kwang
- AD Carry: Lee “Prince” Chae-hwan
- Support: Philippe “Vulcan” Laflamme
This FlyQuest roster had two weaknesses last Spring, support and mid lane. Now they have probably the best support player paired with at his worst the second-best ADC in the league. On the mid lane side, there is no reason VicLa shouldn’t bounce back from his Spring. He already had good games, and even his bad games didn’t seem like he was outclassed. Maybe history repeats itself, but there is simply too much talent in this team for them to not win anything this year.
How to watch the 2023 LCS Summer Split
Fans can catch the LCS action on the official LoL Esports website with a chance to earn exclusive drops from Riot. Or you can follow the official LCS Twitch and Youtube channels.
For more of our LCS and LoL Esports coverage, follow us on ESTNN.
estnn.com
