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The Spring 2017 Promotion Tournaments went as completely differently as possible for the North American and European LCS. In North America, both LCS teams survived, defeating Challenger opponents and earning back their spots in the top flight of play. In Europe, both Origen and Giants Gaming fell to academy teams, which meant two new teams in the EU LCS.
Misfits Academy earned one of those two spots by sweeping Origen and defeating Fnatic Academy 3-2 in the Promotion Tournament. Because organizations can not hold two teams in the same league and Misfits already has an LCS spot, we knew they’d have to sell this one. Friday, Misfits announced to whom: the Mysterious Monkeys.
“When we started the process of selling the team, we spoke with many interested parties,” Misfits CEO Ben Spoont said in the press release. “But ultimately Mysterious Monkeys presented the most compelling overall offer, which included the intent to keep the team together as best they could.”
Dutch jungler Milo “Pridestalker” Wehnes, arguably the star performer of Misfits Academy, will not be joining the new roster and will move to ROCCAT. But these former Misfits Academy teammates will be transferring to Mysterious Monkeys:
- Park “Jisu” Jin-cheol
- Leon “Lamabear” Krüger
- Sofyan “CozQ” Rechchad
- Florent “Yuuki60” Soler
- Han “Dreams” Min-kook
Mysterious Monkeys, a German organization, previously fielded teams in Germany’s domestic ESL Meisterschaft competition and the 2016 EU CS Spring Qualifier (for which they did not qualify). The Monkeys won the most recent Meisterschaft season, defeating EURONICS Gaming in the final.
Former Monkeys players include UOL mid laner Fabian “Exileh” Schubert and G2 substitute ADC Elias “Upset” Lipp.
The other EU LCS spot, owned by Fnatic Academy, remains to be sold. ESPN’s Jacob Wolf reports former EU LCS team Ninjas in Pyjamas is negotiating to buy that spot and return to the league.