Evil Geniuses Academy announced on Friday the arrival of Mitch
“mitch” Semago, stunna, Jake
“jakee” Anderson, Jake
“Paincakes” Hass, Javan
“zerona” Varela, as well as Daniel
“Faded” Hwang as head coach for the 2026
VALORANT season. These changes are part of a broader overhaul of the roster ahead of the
NA Challengers circuit, to launch the project and start the season in the best possible conditions.
Among this lineup, mitch is the player with the most experience at the highest level in North America, having previously competed in
VCT Americas with Cloud9 and already assumed leadership responsibilities. By adding a veteran accustomed to high-pressure matches, EG Academy surround him with profiles already integrated into the NA Challengers ecosystem, notably jakee, who spent the entirety of the year competing with YFP in the North American system. Similarly, Paincakes has also been active in the tier-two scene, spending all of 2025 with Shopify Rebellion Black, while stunna and zerona round out a roster built around players familiar with the regional landscape.
EG Academy have used the offseason to lay the foundations of their developmental structure ahead of the next Challengers cycle. The organization seems to be aiming for a blend of experienced profiles and developing players to establish a stable core from the very start of the season. As the offseason winds down and many organisations accelerate their own roster moves, EG Academy position themselves early for the upcoming battle in NA Challengers.
After a VCT Americas journey that fell short of expectations, Evil Geniuses are now turning toward talent development and appear intent on securing a meaningful place within the North American sub-top ecosystem. Like other organisations that have successfully used academy projects to nurture players who later broke through on the main stage, EG could hope to find in this academy project a new avenue for renewal, following their historic title run at VALORANT Champions 2023.
