Evil Geniuses are world champions, claiming the prestigious title at Valorant 2023. And in a landmark moment for the sport, team coach Christine Chi (aka Potter) becomes the first female coach to win a major esports championship.
The title win comes as a fantastic reversal of fortunes for a team that only just scraped its way past the qualifying rounds.
The first, but certainly not the last. đź’™ pic.twitter.com/F5dOBMVrbn
— Evil Geniuses (@EvilGeniuses) August 27, 2023
A huge reversal in fortunes
Evil Geniuses (EG) claimed a famous victory this weekend in a stunning comeback—one of the best in esports history. In a blockbuster season, EG went from being one of the worst teams in the Valorant Champions Tour to winning the lot.
Such was the scale of the reversal, team coach Potter was practically lost for words. Asked how it felt to be world champion, she simply said, “It feels pretty good.”
Coach Potter then went on to heap praise on a team that many had completely written off.
At the beginning of the season, few could have guessed that EG was poised for greatness. The team was 1-4 (one win, four losses) just four weeks into the tournament. In one game, EG became the first team in VCT history to lose 0-13.
Suffice it to say that nobody expected much from Team Evil Genius in 2023. Yet, that shaky foundation proved to be the launchpad for EG’s victory, as the team went on to win 3-1, and thanks to MIBR beating 100 Thieves, EG scraped through qualifying and won a place in the Tokyo Masters finals.
Evil Genuises are champions
If qualification was the unlikely realization of Team EG’s hopes, what followed next seemed closer to some kind of fever dream.
Having only just qualified for the Masters in Tokyo, Team EG was seemingly reborn. In a string of victories, EG even beat LOUD, the team that inflicted that 0-13 loss in the qualifying rounds. EG then went on to triumph over Paper Rex, the Pacific League champions.
Ultimately, the final came down to just two teams: Evil Geniuses and Paper Rex. Having already beaten Paper Rex once in the tournament, Evil Geniuses seemed to have the edge, and in a repeat of their earlier match, Evil Geniuses stormed to victory.
It was a truly remarkable turnaround in a truly remarkable season. Audience members could be forgiven for rubbing their eyes or pinching themselves to check they hadn’t just imagined what had happened.
They hadn’t.
Evil Geniuses became world champions of Valorant 2023 and proved their doubters wrong.
We love you @omgitspotter đź’™ pic.twitter.com/QMOmdCtSOv
— Evil Geniuses (@EvilGeniuses) August 26, 2023
Coach Potter
In a spicy season filled with drama and one of the greatest turnarounds in the sport, it would be easy to slide over the fact that Christina “Potter” Chi became the first female coach to win an esports crown.
Potter has been with the Evil Geniuses since 2021, first as a player and more recently as a coach. Having endured a number of losses earlier in the season, Evil Geniuses took some serious heat from fans. Potter was understandably on the receiving end of a lot of the criticism.
She was unwavering in her support of the team and its abilities.
“We definitely have not hit our skill ceiling yet,” Potter told One eSports in June. “There’s so much untapped potential, and that is what’s fantastic about this game.”
Now Potter can look back on the season with a sense of righteous vindication, having managed to tap her team’s full potential. The team she assembled and coached are world champions, and she has carved out a small piece of esports history for herself.
and then