NRG’s s0m proves himself in international VALORANT debut at VCT LOCK//IN

For fans who have been watching the VALORANT Champions Tour the past couple years, they were probably very familiar with most of the players on NRG, who beat KOI in their opening matchup of the VCT LOCK//IN tournament on Monday. Pujan “FNS” Mehta, Austin “crashies” Roberts and Victor “Victor” Wong were all part of the highly successful OpTic Gaming squad that won Masters: Reykjavík and finished second at Champions last year. Ardis "ardiis" Svarenieks was on the FunPlus Phoenix team that won Masters: Copenhagen.

But the player who stood out on Monday was 20-year-old Sam “s0m” Oh. With a team-high 36 kills and +10 plus/minus, S0m put to rest any doubts people might have had about the young player who was making his international VALORANT debut.

“It feels great,” s0m told Nerd Street after the match. “I kind of had to prove to myself and all the fans and all the haters, so I think ultimately it feels great to prove to everyone.”

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S0m’s performance, in particular, stood out on the first map of the match, Icebox. NRG were down 1-8 at one point, but managed to come back and win the map 13-11.

It was due in part to the heroics of s0m, whose team-high 24 kills on Icebox included an ace in Round 12 to close out the first half of the map.

S0m said he was very confident in himself and wasn’t nervous about being on stage. Despite being only 20 years old and VCT LOCK//IN being his first international VALORANT LAN tournament, s0m had competed in a LAN setting in Counter-Strike: Global Offensive before making the switch to VALORANT.

“I’ve been to a couple Counter-Strike LANs, so I knew that pressure and the LAN pressure wouldn’t really affect me,” he said. “I kind of just had to prove to myself at the same time as proving to everyone else that I’m capable of doing this.”

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His last CS:GO LAN was Dreamhack Anaheim in February 2020. A few months later he was signed by NRG to their VALORANT team. With the pandemic making offline play unfeasible for most of 2020 and 2021 and NRG not qualifying for any international LANs in 2021 or 2022, it had been three years since s0m had gotten to play on LAN.

S0m said finally getting to play on stage in VALORANT felt nice, especially because of the impact it had on his gameplay.

“The biggest thing for me -- the kills are actually happening. Whenever I shoot my crosshair and there’s someone there, they actually die,” he said.

In s0m we trust

Photo credit: Riot Games

Now that s0m is on one of the 30 VALORANT teams that have partnered with Riot, s0m will get a chance to play on LAN more regularly. After VCT LOCK//IN is over, s0m and NRG will head back to Los Angeles to compete in the 10-team Americas league in a LAN setting at Riot Games Arena. Based on NRG’s performance in the league, the team will have a chance to qualify for two more international LAN tournaments later in the year, Masters: Tokyo and Champions.

The way s0m performed Monday and the fact his teammates were some of the most successful players in VALORANT last year means there’s a pretty good chance we’ll be seeing and hearing about s0m a lot more this year. Being surrounded by veterans like NRG’s in-game leader FNS has put s0m in a perfect situation to shine this year.

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“This is actually my first time playing under the leadership of FNS,” s0m said. “He’s very structured and he definitely knows what he’s doing!”

S0m said it was relatively easy adapting into the structure set up by FNS and learning the system. After NRG’s match against KOI, FNS said he was impressed by the young player.

“He’s doing great, he’s listening to everything we’re saying, he’s giving ideas of his own, and he seems very confident himself,” FNS said. “There were multiple times where he was just like, ‘Guys, leave me be, just trust me’ … for a rookie on LAN in this game it’s very important to me that he was capable of doing that, and it kind of shows me that’s he’s got a lot of growth left in him.”

Photo credit: Riot Games

That potential growth is clearly something that NRG has seen too. After the 2022 VCT season, the organization blew up the roster, letting go of their entire roster except s0m.

“Really grateful and thankful for NRG for giving me my first chance in VALORANT and sticking with me up until now,” he said.

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With roster changes happening so frequently in VALORANT and esports in general, it’s rare for a team to hold on to a player for as long NRG has held onto s0m. In fact, among the expected starters on the 10 Americas teams, only 100 Thieves’ Peter “Asuna” Mazuryk has been with his team longer. Asuna joined 100 Thieves a few days before s0m joined NRG in October 2020.

S0m can continue to prove himself and become more well-known the deeper NRG goes in this tournament. NRG’s next matchup is set to take place on Friday against Giants Gaming.

Lead photo credit: Riot Games