A Competitor Rises: NRG Valorant bolsters for 2023 with Optic Core and FPX Ardiis

A Competitor Rises: NRG Valorant bolsters for 2023 with Optic Core and FPX Ardiis

Ganesh Jadhav

13 Oct, 2022, 14:45

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Last updated: 13 May, 2025, 08:06

NRG Esports announced the addition of one of the most successful NA rosters, Optic Gaming's core, and FPX Ardiis to round out the VCT 2023 roster. The new NRG Valorant roster consists of FNS, Victor, Crashies, Ardiis, s0m, and Head Coach Chet. Alongside Cloud9, NRG's new roster will be one of the best in VCT Americas.

NRG Valorant - An Introduction:

NRG Esports stepped into Valorant by signing daps and Coach Chet with s0m, koler, xceed, and eeiu. The roster goes through multiple iterations; finally, infinite and shanks join to round out the roster.

The roster saw moderate success but could have achieved better results in 2020.

In 2021, tex and Android joined the roster. JoshRT joined as a coach. The team again had moderate success but has yet to make a significant run in an S-tier event. Toward the end of the year, Hazed joined NRG instead of daps.

The team's best iteration came with the addition of Ethan. With Ethan, s0m, eeiu, tex, and hazed, the team reached a secured top in VCT Stage 2 NA Challengers but fell out of VCT NA LCQ 2022 early.

NRG in VCT 2023:

Despite the shaky results, the organizations were a pretty strong name and were selected for Valorant Partnership Program. Soon Hazed, Ethan, Eeiu, Tex, and coach JoshRT announced the release.

Reports of Optic core FNS, Victor, Crashies, and Coach Chet joining NRG esports surfaced, along with the report of one Ardiis, one of FPX's pillars, joining NRG were released.

The players will join s0m for the VCT 2023 season.

NRG Esports Official Twitter announced the players one by one this week, starting with Head Coach Chet "Chet" Singh.

[twitter url="https://twitter.com/NRGgg/status/1589717152034086914"]

The IGL of the team Pujan "FNS" Mehta

[twitter url="https://twitter.com/NRGgg/status/1590071844098478080"]

 

The Sova/Fade Austin "Crashies" Roberts

[twitter url="https://twitter.com/NRGgg/status/1590434107099693056"]

The Entry Duelist/Flex Victor "Victor" Wong

[twitter url="https://twitter.com/NRGgg/status/1590809621232500736"]

The Operator Ardis "Ardiis" Svarenieks

[twitter url="https://twitter.com/NRGgg/status/1591162047978405888"]

The Controller and W Streamer Sam "s0m" Oh.

[twitter url="https://twitter.com/NRGgg/status/1591540492357042176"]

The roster on paper looks like one of the best in NA, being a direct competitor to the hard hitters of Cloud9 Blue.

How good is the new NRG?

Featuring the quartet from NA's best team, The new NRG Valorant has one of the best IGLs in the game, FNS, alongside Victor, Crashies, and Coach Chet. The talent that has proved themselves on the international stage winning the VCT Masters Reykjavik 2022. Optic Gaming was arguably the best squad in Pre-Franchising Valorant.

Joining them will be FPX's Ardiis, an Operator player who can go toe to toe with any operator player in the world. Ardiis with FPX were the VCT Masters Copenhagen Champions, and Ardiis was a huge part of their victory.

The last piece of the roster is s0m, a player with limitless potential who can take up any role. s0m has been making a name for himself in the Valorant scene since dawn, and with NRG's new squad, sOm will probably become one of the best players in 2023.

sOm will take up the controller role in the new line-up while others will stick to their roles, making it an easy adjustment. Victor, Crashies, and Ardiis are already amongst the best in their roles, and FNS and Chet are the best Coach-IGL duo in the scene. With such an impressive line-up, the NRG Valorant is built for success.

Image Source: NRG Twitter

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