Academy Standouts highlights the players who performed best in the most recent week of NA Academy play. I’ll discuss a few of the most noteworthy players, then list some other strong performers below.

Pretty, Mid, Immortals

Three weeks in, and Pretty makes his second appearance in the top 3. You might look at his 1.9 KDA and wonder why he’s on the Standouts list, especially when his team went 0-2 this week, but if you watch the way he played on Azir and Galio, the mechanical and situational plays he made, the positions he put himself in, and the opportunities he created for his team, you can’t help but be impressed by what this man is bringing to the table.

Pretty Stats, 2021 Spring Week 3

	KDA	KP	GXD10	DPM	CSPM
W3	1.9	81.3%	+358	619	8.5
Total	4.3	78.0%	+409	559	8.6

I’m excited to see what Pretty can continue to do this year. After week 1, I said I was “prepared to start revising my opinion of his team’s potential.” Two weeks later, I’m ready to say Pretty might be the strongest Mid in Academy, and one of the best players in the league at any position.

K1ng, Bot, Cloud9

K1ng is part of the short list for “best players in Academy,” alongside Pretty and some others who frequently show up in Academy Standouts. This was the first week where he earned a top 3 shoutout, on the back of a 7.3 KDA and +1,563 GXD10. He continues to be best known for his 2v2 laning, which took a back seat in a couple of Seraphine games in the first two weeks. This week he got his hands on Ezreal and Miss Fortune and took advantage of his opponents for attacking C9’s other lanes, building enormous leads by pressuring towers and then leveraging his gold lead later, especially in the Miss Fortune game.

K1ng Stats, 2021 Spring Week 3

	KDA	KP	GXD10	DPM	CSPM
W3	7.3	71.0%	+1563	554	9.5
Total	6.9	68.1%	+674	432	9.4

Darshan, Top, Cloud9

Last year, Darshan was sneakily one of the best Top laners in Academy, playing for the Golden Guardians. He joined C9 Academy in what appeared to be a second-choice situation, after C9 had signed FakeGod but then immediately sold him onwards to Dignitas. After a couple of whelming weeks, Darshan finally caught our attention with something a little more impressive, playing Gangplank against GG Academy and Renekton against IMT Academy, and racking up enormous early gold and experience leads as well as good damage output and high farm.

It’s the more subtle things that tend to set Darshan apart at the Academy level, like his attention to controlling minion waves and recognizing the map state, but he showed in week 3 that he can also just straight up beat people 1v1, too!

Darshan Stats, 2021 Spring Week 3

	KDA	KP	GXD10	DPM	CSPM
W3	4.3	54.8%	+1614	423	8.3
Total	5.4	53.8%	+24	385	8.2

Additional Standouts

The following players also stood out.

• Chime, Support, Golden Guardians
• Contractz, Jungle, Evil Geniuses
• Eyla, Support, Team Liquid
• Jenkins, Top, Team Liquid
• Jojopyun, Mid, Evil Geniuses
• Kumo, Top, FlyQuest
• Prismal, Bot, Golden Guardians

Photos courtesy flickr.com/lolesports and watch.lolesports.com