LEC - Team Vitality (2/10): Growing Bees, Steady Hive

LEC - Team Vitality (2/10): Growing Bees, Steady Hive | Sheep Esports

Team Vitality promoted two players: Naak Nako and Czajek

After a rather complicated 2024 with a roster that coaches James "Mac" MacCormack and Patrick "Pad" Suckow-Breum were unable to shape in their own image, Team Vitality returns in 2025 with two changes to its roster. The team continues to demonstrate its confidence in its botlane pairing Matyáš “Carzzy” Orság and Zdravets “Hylissang” Iliev Galabov, as well as its jungler Linas “Lyncas” Nauncikas. To accompany them, the two solo laners from the 2024 Academy team are promoted to the main Hive, so toplaner Kaan “Naak Nako” Okan and midlaner Mateusz “Czajek” Czajka will discover the LEC this year.

"I very much coach a LPL-styled League of Legends"

The work for 2025 began quite early for Vitality, the very morning after their elimination from the Summer Split, the two coaches began to define the precise areas of work to be carried out: "We spent a long, long time together sitting down and going through what our philosophy was going to be in terms of the type of team, the type of culture, the type of players, the type of staff, how we were going to do it, the processes, the systems, like the structure, everything,” revealed Mac, the team's head coach.

Unlike last year, the Vitality coaches were therefore able to build the roster they want, and the aim was to establish their own way of working and playing, as Mac explains: “We need five players who are going in the same direction and who are naturally inclined to see the game in the same way”. One of the key points, in addition to the players' adaptability, was to recruit the right players to adopt a very aggressive style of play. “I'm trying to really get us all on the same page, behind the idea of having a really fast-paced playing system [...] We've taken a lot of inspiration from traditional sports and from the LPL. I very much coach a LPL-styled League of Legends,” Mac explained.

Vitality's first change takes place on the toplane, and the choice seemed pretty obvious to Mac. First of all, after two years with Vitality and despite some good individual performances, Kyeong “Photon” Gyu-tae did not find success with the Hive. Discussions between the Korean player and the French structure therefore came about quite naturally on both sides. Moreover, Naak Nako really caught the eye of the Vitality coaches and was the ideal profile to go with the rest of the team. “Naak fits better than Photon with our existing players [...] He is very promising. Individually Naak is really quite exceptional,” told Mac.

A complicated but fitting choice

On the midlane, the choice didn't seem obvious to everyone, even more with the desire to play a very aggressive gameplay. It was only logical that Vincent "Vetheo" Berrié would be considered for this kind of project, since as Mac told us: “Vincent is an incredibly strong laner player, last year he was top 2 or top 1 in laning stats in the LEC, he just was an incredibly strong laner.” But the team was having trouble converting the advantages he was taking into lane. So they turned to a profile that Mac defined as “almost the opposite of Vetheo”, with Czajek, who used to take less space and resources within the LFL roster. “He (Czajek) is an incredibly strong team fighter. I think his situation on awareness is excellent as well, yeah, I think his team fighting sense is excellent," assures the head coach.

“Frankly, for both Naak and Czajek, when you have two players in your academy team who are this good, this promising and fit this world, it would be just silly not to promote them.”

The idea was to add a strong team fighter to keep up with the aggressiveness of the roster, and to capitalize on the early-game lead. Mac and Pad had also worked with Czajek during the EMEA Masters, which convinced them of their choice: “We spent a while working with him when he was still on the LFL, in his playoffs run at EMEA Masters and we saw how quickly he was able to learn and how enthusiastic he was about learning. ”

Yasin “Nisqy” Dinçer was also part of the equation to inherit the midlaner position, a choice that also made sense since the Belgian-Turkish player has already worked with Mac, Pad and the botlane and even won an LEC title in 2023 together. “That one was really complicated, a decision that I agonized over for a long, long time," admits Mac. "At the end it came down to tryouts and honestly when we felt how it was to play with Czajek, we just knew it was the right decision.”

Unshakeable confidence

Mac spoke several times of continuity and stability, which is reflected in the fact that Carzzy, Hylissang and Lyncas are staying for 2025 : “We're very much interested in stability as an org in general. I tend to strongly prefer signing longer-term contracts with players that I believe in. And if there are issues, we work through them.” As for the botlane, Mac's confidence in the two veterans is unshakeable, and the idea of changing one of his two players has never occurred to him.

In fact, Hylissang was extended for three years during the 2024 season, testifying to Mac's desire to create a collective that would function over several years. “Last year we did build a lot of solid fundamentals and I think we made really solid steps towards building a strong foundation, a strong culture, a strong identity. I want to build on top of those steps rather than reset them,” said Mac about the idea of changing a large number of players in the roster.

About Lyncas, Mac made it very clear that he had no intention of replacing him, despite the names available on the market. “I'd be a pretty poor coach if after nine games I didn't back the player that we signed and I didn't back my own judgment on the fact that this player is going to be a good player [...] That (changing jungler) never really crossed my mind,” he revealed. This continuity is also noticeable in the staff, as Mac and Pad are joined by Christophe "Kaas" van Oudheusden, with whom they also worked at MAD Lions.

A global project beyond the leagues

The Head Coach also emphasized that Vitality's decisions were part of a broader project, developed in close collaboration with the LFL team. The idea is not to create a 10-man roster for Mac, but to be a single entity, one project, one team, with two different groups of five players : “We want to develop a similar playing philosophy, similar coaching philosophy, similar resources, similar structures. We're really trying to mirror our approaches across the two teams because we really believe that the best way for Vitality to become a top tier org is to lean into the success that we have had previously working with rookie players.”

Vitality is therefore trying to redefine its project to form a proper League of Legends group. “We want our LEC and LFL players to know each other and have existing relationships with each other [...] which is why we scrim a lot together, they play in houses together,they stream etc.” The aim of Mac and Vitality is to create a global entity with similar operating methods, to create a real DNA within the Hive.

With Danusch "Arvindir" Fischer, the academic team has in fact recruited a new coach who fits in perfectly with this approach since his working methods are similar to those of Mac and Pad.“If like six months ago someone had told me ‘you need to change your academy coach, who would you be your number one person on the list?’ I would have said Arvindir for sure.” The coaching staff are also set to evolve together, as are the rosters.

“We want to have a lot of crossover between coaches. When we’ll be in the offseason, I will offer our help as much as I possibly can, and we are in Berlin, Arvindir is living here as well, so he will be here regularly,” confirmed Mac about the mutual support between LEC and LFL coaches. In 2025, the Bees should be an aggressive team inspired by LPL gameplay, trying to make its two new recruits from the academy shine in an organization looking for continuity.

Team Vitality's 2025 roster:

Top: Kaan "Naak Nako" Okan
Jungle: Linas "Lyncas" Nauncikas
Mid: Mateusz "Czajek" Czajka
ADC: Matyáš "Carzzy" Orság
Support: Zdravets "Hylissang" Iliev Galabov

Header Photo Credit: Team Vitality / Sheep Esports

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