Evil Geniuses enter the Valorant scene with a mixed-gender roster
Published: Jan 28, 2021 - Last Updated: Sep 26, 2022
Like most of the esports industry, Valorant has a majority of all male teams. Now, Evil Geniuses have entered a mixed gendered roster into the NA Champions Tour qualifier.
The team
The team is made up of team captain Christine “potter” Chi, young fragger Claudia “clawdia” Che, former Mamba Mode Gaming pro Ronan “Osias” Jeremiah Javelona, and former Moon Raccoons players Aleksandar Hinojosa and Nolan “Temperature” Pepper.
Valorant is a relatively new esport and it takes some time for established esports organisations to build a team that is worthy of competing. Evil Geniuses took their time for the first year of Valorant’s release and only now, that the major tournaments are becoming official are they entering the competitive scene.
The captain
The team captain Christine “potter” Chi was the first person the organisation recruited for the team. She was a former Counter-Strike: Global Offensive pro who had retired from the scene in 2018 to bring her considerable talents to the streaming world, acting as a caster and analyst for some of the biggest CS:GO tournaments in the world.
This seemed like a good move for potter, who despite coming either 1st or 2nd in every tournament she attended, only made a total of $29,003 in winnings during her 12-year professional career.
Their experience
The team that potter has put together is a good mix of sentinel and initiator-type agents, along with the classic fraggers. The team does have some experience playing Valorant at a professional level. Potter and clawdia had dominated in September’s FTW Summer Showdown. Their team made it to the grand finals without losing a single map in any of their previous matches. The former Moon Racoons players Aleksandar and Temperature were one match away from making it to the First Strike: North American main event.
Despite the level of talent in the roster, they are still a largely untested team. Individually, they all have the talent, but it remains to be seen if they will gel together as a team and be able to compete against other organisations that have already been playing together for months.
Speaking to Dot Esports, Christine “potter” Chi, said:
“My expectations are pretty adjusted. I think it’s going to be a good learning experience. Reps and match time is definitely something that a new squad needs. But I’m going to be telling the squad that we’re gonna destroy these guys.”
Their future
It is depressing that news like this is so rare in the esports scene in 2021. The ceiling for female players seems to be much lower than it is for men. Despite being one of the top CS:GO players around, potter had to bow out of the professional scene. This mirrors the aggression and anger that a misogynist Overwatch fanbase had for Kim Se-Yeon.
For a captain coming back to the competitive scene after a two-year break and an untested team, it is clear that they are considering this event as a testing ground for their abilities. If you are interested in doing some esports betting, I wouldn’t recommend them straight away, but with the level of talent on this team and some time playing as a unit, they could very well be dominating the scene in a few months.
Featured Image Credits: Evil Geniuses
