The year 2025 begins much like 2024 ended in the LCK CL. On Thursday, KT Challengers (KT.C) secured victory in the Kickoff tournament of South Korea’s second division, defeating T1 Esports Academy (T1.EA) 3-1 in the final. After claiming both splits in the 2024 season, KT Rolster’s academy team has now extended its dominance with a third consecutive title. The fourth, counting the victory at the Asia Star Challengers Invitational 2024. Two players have been instrumental in all four triumphs: toplaner Shin “Casting” Min-jae and midlaner Yoo “Zinie” Baek-jin.

KT.C’s victory in this Kickoff tournament appeared almost inevitable, given the team’s commanding performance throughout the split. They went unbeaten in the Group Battle and never faced elimination pressure in the playoffs. Under the leadership of Kang “Spark” Byung-ryul, the squad won all three of its best-of-five series by a 3-1 scoreline, finishing the split with 19 victories and only three losses. They had already beaten T1.EA in the upper bracket final, and this time, KT.C secured two of its victories in just 25 minutes.

Contrasting trajectories of the Telecom War

Jungler Ko “Youngjae” Young-jae and AD Carry Park “Paduck” Seok-hyeon emerged as the standout players in the final. The ADC posted the highest KDA of the series (8.8) and secured 27 eliminations. As a reminder, his direct opponent, Moon “Guti” Jung-hwan, is not T1.EA’s primary AD Carry. That role originally belonged to Sin “Smash” Guem-jae, but Martin “Rekkles” Larsson’s former teammate was promoted to the LCK roster to allow T1 to collect data. Notably, Smash's first LCK game was also a Telecom War.

However, Smash exceeded the game limit for academy eligibility, rendering him ineligible for the playoffs at the lower level. As a result, Guti, originally a midlaner, was forced to role-swap to ADC following Smash’s promotion in early February. This latest clash between the academy teams of KT and T1 further highlights the contrasting trajectories of the Telecom War in its two iterations. While T1 has overwhelmingly dominated the LCK rivalry—winning 41 matches against KT’s 12 since 2014—KT Challengers has asserted its superiority in the LCK CL, securing 18 series wins to T1.EA’s six.