The second 2026 split of the
League of Legends Championship Series (
LCS) under its original name is about to kick off. The Spring Split starts this Saturday with an LCS Lock-In Finals
rematch between Cloud9 and LYON. With no reported changes at the writing of this article,
this marks the first time no roster changes have happened between splits in the thirteen-year history of the LCS. Several teams were forced to field emergency substitutes for a couple of weeks of the 2026 LCS Lock-In, mostly because of visa issues, but the intended starters arrived to complete the split.
Most recent LCS Splits have featured at least six roster changes, but there was one recent split that had just a handful of changes. Before 2026, the split with the fewest number of changes was the LTA North Split 2, which featured only a couple of changes from LTA Northâs inaugural tournament.
The first roster change happened because
was forced to field
as a temporary substitute for Split 1. When Split 2 rolled,
Gonçalves had his visa approved and was able to debut with the Rebels. Zeyzal was a temporary fix, but he played for the complete duration of the first split.
The second change happened to
, the current champions at the time. NACL standout
was promoted from
DarkZero DragonSteel to share the jungle position with
at the tail-end of Split 2. Yuuji would debut in the last week of the regular season and play most of the matches of Team Liquidâs playoff run.
Why could changes be slowing down?
During the first years of the LCS, roster changes were extremely frequent. A quick scan of the encyclopedia entries from the first six splits illustrates how often these changes occurred during the season. As the LCS steadied and developed, roster volatility receded within the same split. Teams adapted and started implementing roster changes for the second split of the season, the split with Worlds qualification.
With the addition of a preceding Winter Split, teams are encouraged to develop players ahead of the season-deciding Summer Split. The social and political state of North America could also influence the process of importing players, thus inadvertently stretching the time rookies have to develop. Of course, as LCSâs own Barento âRaz" Mohammed correctly points out, there is still time for teams to change their rosters during the season.
