The first competition of the season of the LCK second-tier league 2025 LCK Challengers League Kick-off, finally opens on the 13th
Jan 13, 2025
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The LCK Challengers League (hereinafter referred to as LCK CL) is a professional league in which the second division of the LCK team participates. In line with the reorganization of LCK this year, the regular season and playoffs will be held before the regular season 'kickoff' competition and later reorganized into a single season system. In addition, with the full-fledged application of the Peerless Draft, which was introduced on a trial basis last season, restrictions on the selection of champions will accumulate up to the fifth set. Thanks to these changes, this season is expected to be more intense and strategic.
Kick-off is the first split competition before the regular season and consists of three stages: group battle, play-in, and play-off. In the group battle, 10 LCK CL teams are divided into two groups of five teams and cross-match is conducted in a first-round robin manner with different groups of teams. KT Rolster, the 2024 Summer Season winner, chose the HERALD group, while runner-up D-plus Kia was assigned to the DRAKE group to proceed with the team draft.
The HERALD group included KT, DRX, BNK PEARX Youth, T1 Esports Academy, DN Freaks and DRAKE groups, Hanwha Life eSports, OK Savings Bank Brion, and Nongshim Red Force.
The opening game will begin at 2 p.m. on the 13th with a game between DN and Nongshim. T1 and Brion will then face off at 4:30 p.m., followed by BNK and Hanwha Life Insurance at 7 p.m. In particular, Ha Seung-min, a Jungler from OK Savings Bank who won the Academy League in the second half of the LCK Academy Series (hereinafter referred to as LCK AS), will move to T1 Esports Academy this season and is expected to play in the second division.
KT and D-Plus will play at 5 p.m. on the 14th, and DRX and Gen.G. will play at 7:30 p.m. In particular, it is expected that top liner from D-plus Kia Youth, the winner of LCK AS's academy league in the first half of the year, Kwon Jae-hyuk, and supporter Noh Hyung-seop will become next-generation prospects as they call up to the second-tier stage.
Based on the group battle performance, the kick-off player and the team that will advance to the playoffs will be determined. By summing the team performances of each group, the group with more wins is divided into 'winner group' and the group with less wins is divided into 'loser group'. The winners group 1st and 2nd place advance to the second round of the playoffs, and the 3rd place advance to the first round of the playoffs. Meanwhile, the winner group 4th and 5th, and the loser group 1st to 4th will advance to the play-in and play again for the playoff spot.
The six teams that advanced to the play-in will be assigned to the top seed in the order of the highest number of group battle wins, regardless of the group. The play-in will be played in a total of two rounds and a final round, with the top three teams advancing to the playoffs. The six teams that advanced to the playoffs will play until the second round, then play the winner and loser of the third round. After that, the loser of the third round and the winner of the loser will play for the final, and the winner of the third round and the winner of the final will face each other in the final. The winner of the kickoff will be awarded 15 million won, and the MVP of the finals will receive 1 million won.
The game will be held at WDG Studio Hongdae located in Mapo-gu, Seoul, and on-site tickets will be available at the ticket link 72 hours before the game starts. Sim Ji-soo, caster Lee Sung-hoon, Kim Dong-joon, Shin Jung-hyun, and announcer Kwon Yi-seul and Kim Ok-young will participate in the interview with the commentary of Lee Seo-haeng. Live online broadcasts are available on Naver esports, LCK CL official YouTube, and SOOP.
This article was translated by Naver AI translator.
