An overall look at how all ten LCS teams are performing throughout the Spring Split.
There are some big broadcast changes coming into the year. The league switched the gamedays from weekends to weekdays, Thursdays and Fridays during regular weeks. Also, some broadcast members won’t be appearing as regulars, with James “Dash” Patterson parting ways with Riot as the regular show host and David “Phreak” Turley retiring from casting LCS.
The split itself kicked off on January 26 with Week 1. The Spring Split Finals location also has been revealed ahead of the opening day, which will be held in PNC Arena in Raleigh, North Carolina on April 8-9. Tickets for the Finals went on sale during Week 1, Day 2.
This power rankings list will be updated throughout the split with each week of games, and readers can find the full schedule for the 2023 LCS Spring Split here.
2023 LCS Spring Split Daily Recaps
10. Dignitas (Ranked 9th last week)
- Top lane: İrfan Berk “Armut” Tükek
- Jungle: Lucas “Santorin” Tao Kilmer Larsen
- Mid lane: Nicolaj “Jensen” Jensen
- AD Carry: Trevor “Spawn” Kerr-Taylor
- Support: Lee “IgNar” Dong-geun/Vincent “Biofrost” Wang
Week 2 Update
Throughout their four games in two weeks, Dignitas looked dead in the water. Although this team had some potential coming into the split with their big-name signings, they showed near zero when it comes to their play on the Rift. They don’t have any lanes that can win in a vacuum, their teamfighting isn’t good and they have an abysmal macro play. Jensen had some positive moments, but even he isn’t a net positive with his tendency to die early ganks. Sure, they are playing with a stand-in, but the difference between Bio and IgNar isn’t enough to justify this level of play. Unless some drastic changes happen, this split is looking like a disaster for Dig.
Pre-Season Prediction: 7th Place
There are two endings for the 2023 Dignitas roster. The budget super team, or the retirement home. Nearly all players on this roster, with the exception of the rookie Spawn, are players who played on championship contenders and who won trophies. But they also either didn’t have the best 2022 or have been very inconsistent. Well, apart from Santorin who was trying to drag Team Liquid on his back. So it’s hard to say whether they will be a good playoff team or just crash and burn. I’m just hoping it’s the former for the sake of Santorin, but not too optimistic.
9. Immortals (Ranked 10th last week)
- Top lane: Mohamed “Revenge” Kaddoura
- Jungle: Shane Kenneth “Kenvi” Espinoza
- Mid lane: Nicholas Antonio “Ablazeolive” Abbott
- AD Carry: Edward “Tactical” Ra
- Support: Kadir “Fleshy” Kemiksiz
Week 2 Update
Some signs of life in Immortals against CLG. We finally got to see them draft a carry jungler, especially happy it was Kenvi’s Kindred. He didn’t have the best game, with the smite incident fresh in everyone’s mind, but he is still probably the biggest talent on this team so they should give him more space to work with. Still don’t think Immortals will be that good of a team in Spring, but they have some hardworking players, so there is always a chance to get better.
Pre-Season Prediction: 10th Place
It’s getting harder and harder to get excited about Immortals with each split. This will be the third split in which they are building around Revenge, but he still hasn’t shown enough improvement. This is especially worrying since both Ablazeolive and Tactical also suffers from the same fate. Once regarded as one of the better prospects in their positions, neither player took the next step into LCS stardom. With the other two players on the team being relatively inexperienced, I don’t have any significant expectations for Immortals once again.
8. TSM (Ranked 8th last week)
- Top lane: Colin “Solo” Earnest
- Jungle: Lee “Bugi” Seong-yeop
- Mid lane: Huang “Maple” Yi-Tang
- AD Carry: Toàn “Neo” Trần
- Support: Jonathan “Chime” Pomponio
Week 2 Update
As expected, the TSM hype train stopped in Week 2. They got outclassed in their two games against EG and 100T, and the lack of talent in their carry positions started to show. Neo and Chime are not a good enough laners to carry games by drafting early game lanes, so they might need to start drafting more scaling for their bot lane. Also probably shouldn’t put Bugi on Maokai or Maple on Galio, as these two players were their main carries in their Week 1 victories.
Pre-Season Prediction: 9th Place
TSM put together one of the most strange rosters I’ve seen in the LCS in recent years. They don’t seem to have a clear direction and just stuck with players who helped them avoid disaster last split. I’m happy that players like Chime and Solo are getting a chance on a roster, but I’m not sure how this specific one should be functioning. They don’t necessarily have strong laners or star players, and the team hasn’t been together long enough to beat people with the power of friendship. Maybe they can get an upset here and there, but TSM fans shouldn’t expect too much more.
7. Golden Guardians (Ranked 7th last week)
- 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
Week 2 Update
Golden Guardians are one of the best 0-4 teams I’ve ever seen. They never looked that hopeless in any of their games, always managing to stay in the fight. It’s mainly thanks to River, who is once again having a pretty good split. Considering Gori only had a week with the team to practice, it’s reasonable to expect GG to get much better once the mid/jungle duo starts building more synergy. A big worry for GG is Licorice. He looked abysmal so far, not even close to the top laner he was two or three years ago. For GG to succeed, Licorice needs to relearn how to lose lanes without giving up too much as River will probably focus on his mid lane in most games.
Pre-Season Prediction: 8th Place
The first try at the River experiment didn’t go that well for Golden Guardians. He was single handily carrying Dignitas’ playoffs hopes in Spring 2022, but couldn’t show the same performance last split. But I have some hopes for 2023, with Gori joining the lineup. I think he will be one of the best signings of the Spring. He is coming into the LCS as the reigning MVP of the PCS, and he has experience playing in LPL and LCK. If Stixxay can keep up his play from last Summer Playoffs with huhi behind him, they might make a push for the playoffs.
6. Counter Logic Gaming (Ranked 4th last week)
- Top lane: Niship “Dhokla” Doshi
- Jungle: Juan Arturo “Contractz” Garcia
- Mid lane: Cristian “Palafox” Palafox
- AD Carry: Fatih “Luger” Güven
- Support: Philippe “Poome” Lavoie-Giguere
Week 2 Update
Just like TSM, CLG’s performance from the first week also didn’t carry over. They had some weird draft choices, especially against C9 with the Orianna and the Irelia blind pick against Immortals. But I think they have a leeway when it comes to their drafting, as they were one of the most creative teams in the league last year. They are good at finding comps no one thought of, and even if these didn’t work in Week 2, they will come back with something stronger. One thing I would love to see more though is more early game junglers for Contractz. This team is day and night when Contractz gets off to a good start, and they should think about allocating more resources to it during the draft.
Pre-Season Prediction: 6th Place
Counter Logic Gaming is the only team that did not make any changes coming into the 2023 Season, thankfully so. They were the most exciting team to watch the last split, and the hope is they can continue playing their style. But unfortunately, I don’t think they can repeat their performance performance-wise. The 2022 Summer Split was a very weird one, with multiple teams struggling to find their form and peaking only toward the playoffs like Cloud9. Combine this with teams like FlyQuest making significant upgrades, they might be a little left behind. Still, CLG fans still have a lot to cheer for as their team is at least guaranteed to play with everything they have.
5. Team Liquid (Ranked 6th last week)
- 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
Week 2 Update
The disaster was averted for TL as they turn the ship around with two big wins. Sure, the wins weren’t the cleanest, and they still have some big holes in their individual performances, but they still closed out both games. The biggest positive is Yeon looked like a top tier ADC, and his 2v2 with CoreJJ is pretty solid. The most obvious negatives, on the other hand, were the two solo laners. Both Haeri and Summit made some head-scratching mistakes from getting caught in no man’s land multiple times, dying to the most obvious ganks to one of the worst Teleports LCS fans saw. If these two clean up their play, TL has some potential with Yeon/CoreJJ duo at the helm.
Pre-Season Prediction: 5th Place
Dubbed TLCK by the fans online, Team Liquid build a full Korean-speaking roster with two big imports after a year where they get burned by them. It will be interesting to see if their strategy pays off, but fans should temper their expectations. We know Summit himself can carry a team to the top during the regular season, he is the 2022 Spring LCS MVP for a reason, but other top laners should be more ready for him this time around. They also promoted two Academy players to the roster, which means TL intends to invest some time in this project. I can see them making some noise in Summer after Haeri and Yeon adjust to the LCS level, but it’s hard for them to come out the gate at the level of some of the other squads.
4. 100 Thieves (Ranked 5th last week)
- Top lane: Milan “Tenacity” Oleksij
- Jungle: Can “Closer” Çelik
- Mid lane: Søren “Bjergsen” Bjerg
- AD Carry: Yiliang “Doublelift” Peng
- Support: Alan “Busio” Cwalina
Week 2 Update
Are we sure Doublelift took the last two years off? Because he is playing like he didn’t, and he has been dominating bot laners in the three games he wasn’t on Varus. One thing to note though is all three of these games were on Zeri. I still would love to see him and Busio to show different picks in the bot lane, but maybe don’t brake what’s working. Things are also been good at the top side, Bjergsen has been much more active around the map roaming with Closer, whose early games are all about helping mid lane so far. Keeping in mind the fact they only won against the bottom three of the league, 100T is still looking much better than I gave them credit for.
Pre-Season Prediction: 4th Place
Not only Doublelift returns to professional League of Legends, but he is once again reunited with Bjergsen. We saw this duo win multiple titles before, but his time their job will be a lot harder. Not only is Doublelift coming off of a two-year break, but the team will also need to integrate two rookies in a very fast fashion. Luckily for them, both Busio and Tenacity have enough talent to speed up the process, but most of the time winning takes time.
With just the name value, a team comprised of Closer, Bjergsen and Doublelift sounds like a title contender. But unlike the last half-decade of LCS, the league’s mid lane pool is in a good state and Bjergsen had some games where he struggled to impact the game. If we get the Bjergsen/Doublelift duo from 2020 Summer, and Closer from any of the last three splits, 100 Thieves can be the title favorites in the Summer Split. But Spring might be too early for their rookies.
3. Evil Geniuses (Ranked 3rd last week)
- Top lane: Kim “Ssumday” Chan-ho
- Jungle: Kacper “Inspired” Słoma
- Mid lane: Joseph Joon “jojopyun” Pyun
- AD Carry: Victor “FBI” Huang
- Support: Philippe “Vulcan” Laflamme
Week 2 Update
A cleaner week from EG was nice to see. Also the Spring Split finally started for Jojopyun, who seemed to take the first week off for some reason. The top side of the map for the Geniuses isn’t still on full power, we haven’t seen any early dives or roams toward the top lane, and there are some problems with their teamfighting, but it was a much better week for them. On the other hand, FBI has been a great addition to the team. He and Vulcan’s better laning is giving Inspired a lot more opportunities in the early game, and he is not lacking in the 5v5s either. If they can polish their individual performances a little more, EG might be able to challenge FlyQuest.
Pre-Season Prediction: 1st Place
Losing Impact and Danny for 2023 has been a significant blow for Evil Geniuses, but if I had to choose two players to replace them, I would probably choose Ssumday and FBI. It’s arguable who’s better between the two top laner, probably changes with each match-up. And even though FBI may not have the same late-game teamfight presence as Danny, he is still one of the best bot laners in the league, not to mention he is a better laner. He might also be a better fit with this jungle/support duo as well. Both Inspired and Vulcan are very active players in the early game, so an ADC who will contribute to this activity might give EG access to another playstyle.
Of course, this will also be the second year for Jojo, and there is a big expectation to see him take another step forward. He already showed he can be a great team player who will roam the map last split, mainly after the MSI, but this Spring I’d like to see him play more traditional carries as well. A combination of star power and a preexisting synergy of their three core players makes Evil Geniuses favorites to win their second Spring Finals in a row.
2. Cloud9 (Ranked 2nd last week)
- Top lane: Ibrahim “Fudge” Allami
- Jungle: Robert “Blaber” Huang
- Mid lane: Dimitri “Diplex” Ponomarev
- AD Carry: Kim “Berserker” Min-cheol
- Support: Jesper “Zven” Svenningsen
Week 2 Update
It wasn’t that surprising to see Cloud9 look uncoordinated against Fly. This team always had poor showings from time to time, mainly because they are very dependent on Blaber. After the early 2v2 they lost in the mid lane, he was totally out of the game which was the case for the rest of the team. Still, both Blaber and C9 showed in the past they can and probably will bounce back. Bigger worries so far are Diplex’s performance, especially his laning, and Berserker. So far, Cloud9 haven’t been playing toward their bot lane and we didn’t see a big carry game from Berserker. I think this is mostly due to their support picks which have been lane focused, but I would love to see more scaling for their young ADC from them.
Pre-Season Prediction: 3rd Place
Reigning champions are coming in at the number three, even though they only made one roster change. I think there is a big chance Diplex might be an improvement over Jensen as the latter wasn’t consistent enough on carry champions for Cloud9. But even with the possible improved roster, the worry is that their Summer Playoffs victory was too reliant on the meta at the time, with Berserker dominating other bot lanes on Zeri plus enchanters. We are still seeing Zeri getting played in other regions, but with nerfs on the horizon, C9 fans should hope he broadened his champion pool.
There were also big consistency issues for Cloud9 in Summer. Fudge, Blaber and Zven had games they looked like the best players in the league, and then played like it was their first time as a team. They are in third place with the expectations of them improving their communication problems, and Zven getting comfortable on more champions. Sure, there are a lot of caveats, but these players have proven themselves time and time before.
1. FlyQuest (Ranked 1st last week)
- Top lane: Jeong “Impact” Eon-young
- Jungle: Mingyi “Spica” Lu
- Mid lane: Lee “VicLa” Dae-kwang
- AD Carry: Lee “Prince” Chae-hwan
- Support: Bill “Eyla” Nguyen/Kim “Winsome” Dong-keon
Week 2 Update
With their victory over, there is no question about the best team in North America, at least not at the moment. What was great about the C9 game was the fact that Prince had his quietest game yet. He wasn’t that big of a factor, but this time we saw VicLa step up and take the reigns. So far, all four of the FlyQuest starters look like they are the best players at their positions, a scary thing to consider. Although there are some question marks like how good will Spica look on carry junglers or how good are Fly at playing from a deficit, these questions are neither that important nor am I worried about Fly not being able to do these things.
Pre-Season Prediction: 2nd Place
What an off-season it has been for FlyQuest. After chasing playoffs with a limited budget roster for two years, the organization finally build a roster that can legitimately challenge the LCS trophy. While they have a very young core, all of these players showed they could play at a very high level for at least a season before. The only exception to this is Eyla, but even he has a small sample size of games from last year when he subbed for TL. So the expected floor for this five-man roster is pretty high, they should at the very least finish top-three. And if all five players come into the season firing at all cylinders, well the league might be in trouble.
Although I’m not expecting them to do that from the start. Both VicLa and Prince might need some time to adjust to NA and to communicate in English on the Rift. Still, it’s almost certain that they will be one of the championship favorites once the playoffs start.
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