The NLC Division 1 regular season has concluded and the top six teams progressing to the NLC Summer Playoffs 2022 have been confirmed.
Dusty are the current kings of UK, Ireland and Nordics League of Legends after completing an incredible ten-win streak.
They won the regular season with 14 wins and four losses, ahead of JD XL, who slipped up right at the end of the season with a five-loss streak.
For more on Dusty, check out our interview with Dusty ADC DenVoksne
JD XL, X7 Esports and Riddle Esports each finished with 12 wins and six losses, finishing second, third and fourth respectively.
Astralis Talent reached fifth place with ten wins and eight losses, as did Bifrost in sixth place.
Towards the bottom of the table, NYYRIKKI finished seventh, Vanir eighth, MNM Gaming ninth and Team Singularity bottom. Vanir fans will be disappointed in particular as the team showed promise, but has just got off the back of a six-loss streak.
For the Spring 2023 NLC season, teams from Division 2 will have a chance to gain promotion to Division 1.
The top six teams in Division 1 will now participate in the NLC Summer 2022 playoffs to fight for a spot in the EU Masters, where they will battle with the top League of Legends teams from other European Regional Leagues.
It’ll be a usual playoffs format. Some have asked if a points system will be used, but it won’t. Points are only a consideration for Division 1 Relegations.
It’s good news for the top six teams, as half of them will progress to the EU Masters, rather than the usual third.
A few days ago, it was announced that NLC finally got its third Amazon EU Masters seed after nabbing a Main Stage spot from the Greek Legends League. This means that three NLC teams will progress to the EU Masters (two to the Main Stage and one to the Play-ins), as opposed to two (one to the Main Stage and one to the Play-ins).
Looking to the NLC 2022 Summer playoffs, then, and top seeds Dusty and JD XL have progressed to round two, and will play on August 8th 2022 at 5pm BST.
The other four teams will play on August 1st (X7 vs Bifrost) and August 3rd (Riddle vs Astralis Talent), also at 5pm BST.
What about NLC Division 2 and below?
Irish esports organisation Nativz topped the NLC Division 2 Summer 2022 table, with 14 wins and four losses, like Dusty in Division 1.
Nativz announced a 2022 jersey partnership with Umbro and separate deal with coral reef sustainability business ALotMeant.com late last year.
Rate Gaming, Lundqvist Lightside, Domino Esports, UniQ Esports Club and Rising Dawn Esports also made it into the top six and will now play in the playoffs.
UK orgs LDN UTD and Lucent Esports finished in the bottom two, with Munster Rugby Gaming and Guarp Gaming in the seventh and eighth positions.
The Division 2 playoffs will take place from August 4th 2022 at 5pm BST, with Lundqvist and Rising Dawn going head to head first.
A year ago, Riot Games announced a restructuring of its European Regional Leagues in League of Legends.
Along with this, Freaks 4U Gaming took over as tournament organisers of the NLC for the UK, Ireland and Nordics, taking the reins from DreamHack. This Northern European region of course consists of the UK, Ireland, Sweden, Finland, Denmark, Norway and Iceland.
As part of the changes to the ERLs, a ‘multi-division league ecosystem’ was adopted, similar to the League of Legends Prime League in the DACH region. This meant the NLC would consist of Divisions 1, 2, 3, 4 and 5.
The final matches in Summer 2022 NLC Division 3 and below are still to be played, and details of an offline NLC event are still to be revealed. Accredited League of Legends ERLs are expected to host one offline event per year.
Dom is an award-winning writer and finalist of the Esports Journalist of the Year 2023 award. He graduated from Bournemouth University with a 2:1 degree in Multi-Media Journalism in 2007.
As a long-time gamer having first picked up the NES controller in the late ’80s, he has written for a range of publications including GamesTM, Nintendo Official Magazine, industry publication MCV and others. He worked as head of content for the British Esports Federation up until February 2021, when he stepped back to work full-time on Esports News UK and offer esports consultancy and freelance services. Note: Dom still produces the British Esports newsletter on a freelance basis, so our coverage of British Esports is always kept simple – usually just covering the occasional press release – because of this conflict of interest.
