Following a disappointing end to the 2020 League of Legends season, Evil Geniuses has decided to move on from head coach Heo “Irean” Yeong-cheol. This marks the end of Irean’s second stint with a North American team.
EG made a return to the LCS at the start of the year by acquiring the spot from Echo Fox. The org also made some big splashes during that offseason, signing Bang, Svenskeren, Zeyzal, and Jiizuke. EG also signed Irean as its head coach fresh off a year with CLG.
The team stamped their mark on the LCS by finishing in second place during the 2020 Spring Split but failed to get past FlyQuest in the playoffs. The following season, the team ran into roster cohesion issues that caused them to drop to sixth place in the regular season standings. Once again, they were eliminated in the playoffs, this time by C9.
After these disappointing results, it was clear that some changes had to be made. For the amount of resources that must have been pooled into EG’s coaching staff and roster, a sixth-place finish with an early playoff exit likely wasn’t acceptable to the org.
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No roster moves have been confirmed yet, but Irean’s departure could mark the start of some bigger changes for the team. There have been some question marks surrounding the team’s mid lane, for example, with the presence of both Jiizuke and Goldenglue—the latter replaced the former for the last few weeks of the split.
Once the 2020 offseason is fully underway, we might see some major moves incoming for EG and many of NA’s rosters ahead of next year.
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