Meet the teams competing at Nerd Street’s VALORANT Summer Championship

Nerd Street’s Summer Championships are moving right along. First, Rocket League crowned South American RLCS X champions True Neutral as Summer Champs. Then Apex Legends saw a heated tournament wind up with eRa narrowly beating out Spacestation Gaming and Pittsburgh Knights.

The Summer Championship for VALORANT comes next, with League of Legends and Rainbow Six: Siege to follow. Of all the Summer Championships, VALORANT has more well-known organizations in it than any other.

Learn more about Nerd Street's Summer Championships!

Summer Champs will be a true test of the up-and-coming teams in the scene. Plenty of players at VCT’s Stage 3 Challengers Playoff have spent time in the Summer Champs circuit. There were three ways to qualify for Summer Champs. Finish top two in a monthly tournament, be a leader in circuit points after all results in weekly/monthly tournaments or win a head-to-head matchup for the Last Chance Qualifier.

With that being said, here are the teams locked into Nerd Street’s Summer Championships:

Monthly qualifiers

Renegades

Roster: Ryan “Winsum” Johns, Devon “randyySavage” Breard, Alexander “retrQ” Kadan, Roy “StrongLegs” Ahad, Justin “Jerk” Milani

No team has dominated Nerd Street events like Renegades over the last five months. They took first time and time again to hold a commanding lead in circuit points. Renegades locked up qualification in the April monthly but kept coming back to make it clear they were the team to beat across Summer Champs.

Complexity Gaming

Roster: Riley “ohai” Nguyen, Michael “agm” Abood, Jacob “valyn” Batio, Joel “jcrueL” Cruel

One of the oldest esports organizations in North America, which often had a top CS team, Complexity’s VALORANT squad is still working to break into the top tier. This will be a great opportunity for them to ascend a level and show why Complexity have become a name synonymous with FPS esports.

Rise Nation

Roster: Jason “neptune” Tran, Kevin “poised” Ngo, Ryan “Shanks” Ngo, Derrek “Derrek” Ha, Phat “supamen” Le

The teams in Nerd Street events knew how good Rise was, but the rest of the VALORANT world got to see it at the VALORANT Champions Tour Challengers Playoffs. After being the surprise addition to the stacked eight-team field, Rise held their own against the best teams in the game.

In Round 1, Rise took a map off Sentinels before losing 2-1. Then, in the lower bracket, Rise were able to beat TSM, sending the former powerhouse out of the tournament without a win. Finally, another 2-1 defeat by XSET and Rise were out of the tournament. But for a team playing on its biggest stage by far, Rise showed they can hold their own against top-tier competition.

Now they will take that momentum into Summer Champs as one of the favorites to win the entire tournament. Plus, Rise locked up a spot in VCT’s Last Chance Qualifier. Rise and C9 Blue will be the only teams in this tournament who still have a shot to potentially make VALORANT Champions, the end-of-the-year world championship.

TSM Academy (Formerly Noble)

Roster: Colin “Precision” O’Neill, Nathaniel “payen” Lopez, Timothy “ZK” Ly, Brandon “bdog” Sanders

Noble were consistently a team that seemed to find talent in the Tier 2 level. Unfortunately, in July, after this team qualified for Summer Champs, Noble released the team’s roster. The departure of Aleko “Leviathan” Gabuniya to TSM was a big reason why. It was announced Wednesday that the rest of the team (along with EZ5's Carlo “Dcop” Delsol) was being signed by TSM to become TSM Academy.

EZ5

Roster: Andrew “Gucc107” Gutnichenko, Erik “Kanpeki” Xu, Jake “Paincakes” Hass, Corbin “C0M” Lee

Also one of the top unsigned teams, EZ5 wanted to be signed as a five-man group. With players like Dcop, Kanpeki and Paincakes, it certainly seemed like they were in a position to entice an org. After months of looking, the team announced in early August that they were now open to individual offers for players. Summer Champs could be the last time this five-man squad all competes together on a big stage.

Teal Seam

Roster: Conner “GLYPH” Garcia, Marco “Awkua” Li, Cade “Cade3k” Warren, Chris “LarryBanks” Doyi, seven

Not a ton of info is out there on Teal Seam but the squad won the July Monthly and will look to prove themselves against better competition at Summer Champs. VLR has Teal Seam ranked in the top 30 in North America, one of the higher ranked unsigned squads on those rankings. Great name too.

YFP Gaming

Roster: Matthew “w0rldw1de” Mannine, Juan “meeeeester Juan” Beaufrand, Jeffrey “Reformed” Lu, Jet “Jet” Gao

Similar to Teal Seam, not a ton of info for the other July Monthly qualifier. They finished second to Teal Seam in the final of that tournament. VLR has YFP Gaming one spot below Teal Seam in their rankings as well, still in the top 30 though.

Circuit point qualifiers

Virtuoso

Roster: Zach “EleyTY” Stauffer, Kaloyan “iKoniK” Iliev, Alex “Lin” Gariepy, Vincent “Apotheon” Le, Louis “snxper” Lama

Virtuoso have been one of the most consistent teams in Nerd Street’s weeklies for the last few months. The team’s grind also paid off with a win over NRG in the Stage 3, Challengers 1 open qualifier. They would go on to lose to Kansas City Pioneers but if that match had gone the other way, Virtuoso would have broken through to the top tier of VALORANT’s NA tournaments.

Built by Gamers

Roster: Joseph “Bjorklund” Bjor, William “Will” Cheng, Tristan “Critical” Trinacty, Raymond “Rarkar” Xu, Jake “POACH” Brumleve

A talented roster, BBG’s peak during VCT came after the team qualified for Stage 2, Challengers 1. It was a pretty quick exit for them at that tournament and another quick exit at Challengers 2 as well. BBG have broken through to the top level, an accomplishment not many teams in this tournament can boast, but they have a chance at Summer Champs to prove they can beat strong teams consistently.

Team Basilisk

Roster: Gabriel “GMAN” Ordaz, Anderson “Nanners” Lutkehus, Stephen “Berghy” Bergh, Kelden “Boostio” Pupello, Colin “eVoL” Wentworth

Another small team, Basilisk have been a grinder in Nerd Street tournaments as well. Like many of these circuit points teams, they will have one of their best opportunities to compete against strong rosters, especially with former top-tier teams like C9 Blue, NRG and Andbox all making it into the tournament through the Last Chance Qualifier.

DarkZero Esports

Roster: Adam “Ange” Milian, Andy “Andersin” Collins, Kyle “ScrewFace” Jensen, Nick “Harmon” Harmon, Yannick “KOLER” Blanchette

Formerly Kooky Koalas, DarkZero Esports picked up the team recently. Formerly known for a top Rainbow Six team, VALORANT was one of DarkZero’s first expansions outside of R6. DarkZero have been one of the sneaky-good teams in Stage 3. They beat FaZe Clan in the first open qualifier and took a map off XSET before missing Challengers 1. XSET would then go on to beat Sentinels in that tournament. For the next qualifier, DarkZero beat two teams including the Pittsburgh Knights. They took the first map off TSM then lost a 14-12 OT round before dropping the final map. To recap, for a team that hasn’t played in a Challengers closed qualifier, DarkZero have wins over FaZe and Knights with narrow losses to TSM and XSET. Pretty good.

SoaR

Roster: Muhtadi “b0ssy” Al-Sammarraee, Matthew “Cryocells” Panganiban, Alexander “Zander” Dituri

The Canadian organization recently lost Denis “Denya” Kosogov to drop to only three players on the active roster. Look for them to potentially trial some replacements at Summer Champs.

Evil Geniuses

Roster: Nolan “Temperature” Pepper, Christine “Potter” Chi, Mike “Pho” Panza, Brandon “BRANTED” Ballard, Daniel “roca” Gustaferri

Another legacy esports organization that hasn’t totally taken off in VALORANT, EG’s roster is unique in that its mixed gender. The original team included both Potter and Claudia “Clawdia” Che. Since then, Clawdia has dropped to join CLG Red competing in VCT Game Changers. Potter continues to be the team’s IGL and the new roster with pho, Branted and Roca are looking to make a mark.

OOKERS

Roster: Eric “HIA” Boggs, Kevin “mina” Nguyen, Harris “Moechilla” Mesia, Kyle “Kyro” de Castro, Harmful

Another unsigned team that was a constant sight in Nerd Street tournaments, Ookers have talent. But unlike some of the other unsigned teams or lesser known orgs, Ookers are still looking for that breakthrough game against a top team. VALORANT’s upset weekend in the open qualifier for Stage 3 Challengers 1 provided that for many teams. Hopefully Summer Champs provides it for Ookers.

Kansas City Pioneers

Roster: Jason “jmoh” Mohandessi, Tanner “scourge” Kages, Lucas “fiziq” Blow, Chad “Oderus” Miller, Logan “skuba” Jenkins

Speaking of teams that had a breakthrough upset, KC Pioneers actually had two during Challengers 1. First was Immortals, then KCP beat Virtuoso who had just beaten NRG. After taking down Virtuoso, KCP broke through to the eight-team Challengers 1 closed qualifier. While there, they had to play Envy, Version 1 and Sentinels. It was a true trial by fire but KCP were able to take down V1. At Challengers 2, they lost to LG and FaZe. Few teams in this tournament have played as much high-quality competition as KCP has recently. With Oderus balling out, they are a dark horse to win the whole thing.

Resonate

Roster: Armel “leak” Araneta, Eric “xedoba” Lee, Norman “contii” Yeung

A win over NRG is Resonate's biggest accomplishment so far. Unfortunately they ran into a tough LG team right afterward, which prevented them from reaching Stage 3 Challengers 2. Still, that type of win is more than a lot of other teams in this field can say. Resonate could be a breakout performer at this tournament, but it will depend on how the team fills out.

Ghost Gaming

Roster: Dajon “chase” Lopez, Marc-Andre “NiSMO” Tayar, Ryan “ryann” Welsh, GianFranco “koalanoob” Potestio, Danny “huynh” Huynh

Another well-known team, Ghost have had a ton of talent come through the team at various times. Maxim “wippie” Shepelev, V1’s impressive flex player, used to be on the team. Former IGL Will “DazzLe” Loafman was recently added to LG and has been a key piece in pushing that team back to previous highs. Ghost have shown an ability to scout talent, and new additions in koalanoob and huynh will have a chance to showcase that here. Ghost is still currently ranked in the top 15 by VLR, but moving forward without DazzLe won’t be an easy task.

1337

Roster: Babu, Dinxx, sae, Pix, shen

Formerly Insight, 1337 is a team still looking to prove itself. They have comparable results to other teams who have been signed by smaller orgs but don’t have that marquee win yet. VLR has them at 36 in NA.

Pittsburgh Knights

Roster: Damion “XXiF” Cook, Terry “dsr” Rioux, Drake “Exalt” Branly, Jonathan “Silenx” Huntington, Bryan “MAKKA” Drouillard

In addition to Nerd Street, the Pittsburgh Knights have been a key piece of the Tier 2 VALORANT scene. Knights’ monthly tournaments are where a lot of these teams have been battling it out over the last six months. The team itself finished second in their own July monthly and have yet to win one. The Knights have been active with the roster and seem to be playing some of the team’s best VALORANT recently.

DIVIZE

Roster: Theodore “In0X” Bjornsson, Josh “pwny” VanGorder, Henry “Tsuya” Nguyen, Corey “ChurmZ” Koch, jovahnii

On a hot streak recently, DIVIZE is 17-3 in the team’s last 20 games. Many of those wins came against teams in this tournament, including Ghost, 1337, Resonate, YFP and more. Summer Champs will be the team’s next chance to see if this is a streak due to bad competition or if they can keep the momentum going with tougher opponents.

Project 13

Roster: Leandro “Virtyy” Moreno, Justin “Trick” Spears, Jadin “Menace” Wagner, Dwaine “Jangler” Kirkpatrick, Anthony “ZexRow” Colandro

One of only three teams to beat DIVIZE recently (along with Ghost and Built by Gamers), Project 13 is an unsigned team on the rise. Three of Project 13’s last five losses have come against Teal Seam, it could be a budding rivalry to watch if they end up on the same side of the bracket in Summer Champs. This team also features ZexRow, a name familiar to most Fortnite fans. He’s a member of TSM but has mostly been making VALORANT content recently. Zex has a huge following with about 420,000 followers on Twitch.

Big Baller Brand

Roster: Mike “instinct” McGinniss, Liam “Welshy” Newhouse, Kamden “Sugarfree” Hijada, Joshua “Ezire” Felix, RENZ

Big Baller Brand is also the name of a company created by Lavar Ball, the father of NBA players Lonzo and LaMelo Ball. This team is clearly unrelated (right?), but honestly, it's not a bad play. If BBB performs well in Summer Champs, it might be worth tagging the brand to see if they want to expand into esports.

All Around Savants

Roster: Parker “Waltz” Walters, Nate “hyjinx” Kline, Stephen “steph” Casseus, Tyler, hyun

Previously known as Dude I Love Fwogs (one of my all-time favorite open qualifier names), the squad changed to the more standard All Around Savants. It’s disappointing to see, but probably a decent idea to get more attention from orgs. Although I will miss Dude I Love Fwogs in this tournament, the roster will hopefully make its mark under the new name.

Squirtle Squad

Roster: Harrison “psalm” Chang, Jonard “Jonaaa6” Penaflor, Chase “nillyaz” Linder, Erik “d1msumboi” Almhjell, Playboi Joe

Like Project 13, this is also a team headlined by a former Fortnite player. Psalm actually finished second at the Fortnite World Cup in the solo division. That was good for a $1.8 million payday. Before playing Fortnite, he was actually a Heroes of the Storm pro. From MOBA to battle royale to tac FPS, some guys are just gamers.

Squirtle Squad is up there with Kooky Koalas for my all-time favorite unsigned team names. Maybe I just have a thing for alliterations. Squirtle Squad will hopefully begin the evolution to Blastoise Battalion at Summer Champs.

Last Chance Qualifier teams

With Challengers Playoffs teams locked in, a ton of borderline top-tier teams ended up entering the Last Chance Qualifier. With C9 Blue, NRG, Andbox and Immortals all vying to get in through the Last Chance Qualifier, the quality of the tournament increased substantially. At this point, almost every top team that wasn’t one of the eight who qualified for Challengers Playoffs is going to be competing at Summer Champs. The only notable absences are Gen.G and Version1.

NRG

Roster: Sam “s0m” Oh, Daniel “eeiu” Vucenovic, Bradley “ANDROID” Fodor, Ian “tex” Botsch, Matthew “Wedid” Suchan

Oh NRG. This team has more talent than the results show. Ever since Stage 2 Challengers Finals where the team beat XSET before losing to C9 Blue and V1, NRG have struggled. In Stage 3, they’ve been the team smaller teams can point to as the big opponent they’ve taken down. With losses to Resonate, EZ5 and Virtuoso recently, NRG need a good finish here to return to form. With recent championships in Overwatch (San Francisco Shock) and Rocket League, NRG’s name often comes with success. So far, the VALORANT team just hasn’t reached the lofty standards set by the other NRG teams.

C9 Blue

Roster: Mitch “mitch” Semago, Nathan “leaf” Orf, Son “xeta” Seon-ho, Michael “poiz” Possis, Anthony “vanity” Malaspina, Erick “Xeppaa” Bach

Hey, speaking of missed expectations, it’s C9 Blue! After just barely missing out on being NA’s second representative at Masters 2: Reykjavik, C9 Blue completely missed both Challengers closed qualifiers of Stage 3. C9 Blue will be in the Last Chance Qualifier for VALORANT Champions. They will be the only team at that event competing in Summer Champs.

In addition, V1’s IGL vanity is joining the team. At Masters 2: Reykjavik, Vanity perplexed top international teams with some of his post-plant looks. He’s considered one of the best strategists in North American VALORANT. Summer Champs will be the first time we get to see the talented IGL leading C9 Blue.

Immortals

Roster: Amgalan “Genghsta” Nemekhbayar, Andrew “ShoT_UP” Orlowski, Rhett “Kehmicals” Lynch, Daniel “Rossy” Abedrabbo, Jonah “JonahP” Pulice,

I’m keeping with the theme here. Immortals have shown an ability to be impressive talent scouts, with former players moving directly to teams like 100 Thieves (Peter “Asuna” Mazuryk), NRG (Yannick “Koler” Blanchette), Rise (Jason "neptune" Tran), Gen.G (Nicholas "NaturE" Garrison) and Andbox (Noah "jcStani" Smith). Some of those players have continued to move, but Immortals have been clearly able to find plenty of talent. Those players were largely bought out of their deals which has kept the team in flux. It’s hard to say Immortals has technically missed expectations, but the team has achieved more success in the past than they have recently.

Andbox

Roster: Adam “mada” Pampuch, Daniel “vice” Kim

After losing El Diablo to Envy, Andbox is now missing the team’s star player. Jaccob “Yay” Whiteaker was a big part of Andbox’s success but not the only part. Unfortunately, they’ve also lost some other important players like Aaron “b0i” Thao and Noah “JcStani” Smith. Now they only have two players locked into their roster. Summer Champs will be the start of a new era for Andbox.

Team Serenity

Roster: Jack “Add3r” Hayashi, Emre “Dubbin” Eldelek, Austin “Neon” Hedge, Nicholas “Nick” Sahawneh, James “Aiko” Sandberg

The team from the Canadian esports organization has become a staple in lower tier tournaments. But the team that will be competing at Summer Champs is brand new. The full five-man squad was all added on Aug. 7, and Summer Champs will be their first chance to really show what they can do. The roster they picked up was formerly competing under the name DNADIFF. For Team Serenity, they are technically called Team Serenity Black.

Recon 5

Roster: Brenden “Sympul” Miller, Alex “r3p” Tieu, Nicholas “Stealthy” Petrakos, StealthyMike, HOOLiGN

Although many of the last chance teams for Summer Champs were big names in the scene, others are much smaller teams looking to make a name for themselves. Recon 5 is one of them. We don’t know much about them now, but they’ll have a chance against good competition at this event.

Green Beans

Roster: Aloka “Aloka” Gent, Core, Unholykid, Tristiieee, EccentriK

What appears to be a brand new team created specifically for Nerd Street’s Last Chance Qualifier, Green Beans have almost no history. They did play C9 Blue in the group stage of the LCQ losing 13-7, 13-3. It’s one of the better names from an unsigned team and the Green Bean story -- for better or worse -- will be one that begins at Summer Champs.

Kowareta

Roster: Binh “Yoshii” Nguyen, sacred, MaR, chanse, Envys

Again, I don't have much on this squad either. They did beat Built By Gamers in July, a pretty nice win for where the team currently sits. In the Last Chance Qualifier, Kowareta took Immortals to 13-11 in the first map, but the second map ended 13-1. They’ve got a chance for revenge at Summer Champs where they will look to get a defining win for momentum going forward.

What teams to be on the lookout for at Nerd Street’s Summer Championships

I think three teams are the favorites here based on their results in VCT: Cloud 9 Blue, Rise and Kansas City Pioneers. All three have shown the ability to beat high-quality competition. For Rise and KCP, that came during Stage 3. For Cloud 9 Blue, Stage 3 was a disappointment, but they’ve made a key change, brought in a great player and will look to return to Stage 2 form.

Then there’s the dark horses. Rise would have been in this group just last month. This one is more varied but I will put Ghost Gaming, Renegades, Virtuoso and DarkZero Gaming in this camp. If they bring their best games, each one of these teams has the potential to make a run.

The next camp of contenders is the big names that haven’t had results recently. Immortals, NRG, Built By Gamers and Andbox all fit here. These teams have big question marks, but they also have organizations focused on finding the best possible talent. With some real momentum behind them, if these organizations want to invest in the future, these teams could regain momentum that’s been missing for months.

Then there’s the rest. A ton of these teams aren’t signed to orgs or are missing some statement win. For every other team, Summer Champs is a true proving ground. This is where players can get signed to an org, where teams become known and where careers can launch as VALORANT esports begins to shift focus to the second year of VCT. GLHF.