The Rocket League Championship Series is only seven weeks away. That leaves enough time for weekly team by team previews of the world’s best Rocket League teams. This series will act almost as a movie trailers for what to expect during Season 7 for each team.
The second preview will discuss perhaps the most talked about Rival Series team in Rocket League history: Splyce.
Season 6 Results:Â 6-1 record good for first in the RLRS. Swept Rogue (the old one) on their way to promotion.
Off-season Movement:Â None.
Off-season Performance:Â 14th-16th WSOE Qualifiers, Group Stage DreamHack Leipzig, Winners of Renegade Cup Project Phoenix, Winners of Renegade Cup Finals NA this weekend?
Team MVP:Â Jamie ‘Karma’ Bickford
Realistic Team Goal:Â Avoid Relegation
Background and Team History
Splyce is the shining example of why Rocket League needed a second division. In the Season 4 RLRS qualification tournament, Splyce lost three rounds short of qualifying. Karma’s teammates Braden ‘Pluto’ Schenetzki and Chandler ‘HotWheelsSid’ Higdon left to substitute on RLCS teams. Karma refused to give up.
As Season 5 approached she teamed up with Jake ‘JWismont’ Wismont and Trevor ‘DudeWithTheNose’ Hannah and qualified for the RLRS. Things didn’t go so well during league play. They finished 2-5, landed in sixth place and had to go through qualification once again.
Season 6 rolled around and Splyce looked like the best team in qualifiers. They went on a crazy grind between Seasons 5 and 6 and it showed in their mechanics. Splyce only dropped one series on their way to topping the Rival Series.
When the promotion playoff rolled around, they were full of confidence. The team outclassed Allegiance by four games to one and then swept Rogue to earn their spot in the RLCS. Karma was named Promotion playoff MVP and finally achieved her goal of making Rocket League’s top tier.
She’s since become one of the faces of the game. Karma is among the best female esports players in the world and Psyonix is happy to remind fans of that. The first of their Pro-file feature series focused on Karma and her ascent through the ranks of Rocket League.
JWismont and Nose Dude also came into their own as top level Rocket Leaguers during Season 6. This team is just fun to root for.
Splyce’s Best Case Scenario
Splyce’s best case scenario involves a lot of momentum and hard work. Maybe the team can carry their momentum from the Rival Series and make a splash with the big boys. They’re not going to win the league in the first season, but it’s not unreasonable to think they could qualify for LAN.
There was plenty of roster movement in NA during the off-season but Splyce stayed steady. Now they need to hope that some of the player swaps end up being catastrophic for the other teams. The same four NA teams qualified for LAN the last two seasons and the weakest two (G2 and Evil Geniuses) have upgraded. If Splyce is going to make LAN they need to play out of their minds or hope everything around them goes wrong.
Drop off in a player’s ability comes suddenly and sometimes roster moves can’t patch the hole a bad player creates. Just ask SadJunior. If Splyce is going to make LAN, they’ll need to outperform the bottom four and hope to get lucky. If EG’s move to acquire Matt ‘Drippay’ Den-Kaat flops, maybe Splyce can sneak in.
Priority one is avoiding finishing in the relegation zone. They won’t need luck for that. They’ll need the hard work they put into the Season 5 off season to continue on. JWismont is every bit as good as Karma and if the two can elevate their games to the RLCS tier, they can avoid bottom two.
Nose Dude will really need to find an extra gear. He won’t score too much, but in Splyce’s best case scenario he needs to be reliable in every other aspect of the game.
Splyce’s Worst Case Scenario
Splyce could end up relegated and back where they found themselves a year ago. They almost have a predestined pact with the Rival Series that they can’t seem to outrun. In both of the NA RLCS seasons that included recently promoted teams, one promoted team was relegated. It’s almost not a question of if Splyce will be relegated, but rather a question of if it will be them or fellow RLRS conquerors Bread.
It could definitely be Splyce. The squad hasn’t looked great in any of their off season events beside the Renegade Cup, against lesser competition. Maybe they just aren’t talented enough to compete at the highest level or don’t have the game sense needed to keep up with the game’s keenest players.
Maybe because Splyce has already been through so much to get here, they feel tempted to coast a little. There’s no shame in getting bodied by RLCS teams and collecting checks. Fnatic did it for two whole seasons. They’ve been through the Rival Series twice, so why should they be afraid of going through it one more time?
If in the best case scenario teams are hypothetically having chemistry breakdowns, why couldn’t Splyce have one? Karma sure is getting a lot of attention for being an average RLCS player. Google “Splyce Rocket League” and look at how much Karma and Splyce go hand in hand. Could JWismont and Nose Dude get fed up with her stardom?
Probably not, and even if it did happen, it wouldn’t really be their worst case scenario. The absolute worst thing that could happen to Splyce is that they just simply aren’t good enough to compete and look over matched in every series like Allegiance did last season. The team finishes the season 1-6 or 0-7 and gets bumped in the promotion playoffs.
They like each other too much to disband so they stay together and dominate the Rival Series. They then fall into a strange purgatory where they win the RLRS and move up one season then get obliterated and go back down the next. Like Squidward falling into the Fly of Despair the squad is stuck in an endless loop.
TL;DR:Â Splyce would have to get lucky or significantly elevate their play to avoid relegation. If they do, they might have a shot at making LAN.
Featured image courtesy of Splyce.
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