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 standouts, then list some other players whose performances caught my eye below.
Last week there were two Quarterfinals matches, so I’m going to highlight the standout player from each series.
k1ng, Bot, Cloud9 Academy
C9 Academy’s star bot laner carried them to a reverse sweep against an Evil Geniuses Academy team that had them on the ropes.
A quiet Aphelios in game 1 was followed by four outstanding performances, with two games each on Ziggs and Varus.
With k1ng in this kind of form, C9A might actually be contenders again.
k1ng Stats
| KDA | KP | GXD10 | DPM | CSPM | |
| QFs | 9.6 | 66.7% | +693 | 650 | 10.5 |
A triumphant 4-0 week capped off the summer split for Eyla and TLA, and Eyla was the constant driver of their victories. He played Thresh twice against FLY Academy, then Rell and Leona IMT Academy. Those are two pretty stiff opponents, especially when you consider that the FLYA bot lane of Johnsun and Dreams spent much of the summer in the LCS.
C9 Academy put together a much stronger set of games in week 8 than they had been recently, going 3-1 and benefiting greatly from Isles delivering on a diverse range of picks. He played Rell, Nautilus, Taric, and Karma, and performed equally well on all four.