Kaas joins 100 Thieves as head coach

100 Thieves of the League Championship Series (LCS) officially announced today that Belgian "League of Legends" coach Christophe "Kaas" van Oudheusden will be the team's head coach in 2023, as initially reported by BLIX.gg reporter Alejandro "anonimotum" Gomis on Nov. 4.

Kaas was an assistant coach for MAD Lions of the Europe, Middle East and Africa (EMEA) Championship in their first season in 2020, and he's been a strategic coach for the team in the two years since. In 2021, MAD Lions won both the LEC Spring and Summer Splits and even made it to Quarterfinals at the 2021 League of Legends World Championship, where they lost 3-0 to eventual finalist DWG KIA from League Champions Korea (LCK). The team also made Worlds in the other two seasons Kaas coached them, 2020 and 2022.

https://twitter.com/100T_Esports/status/1597357187663245312

100T also announced that Dutch jungler Thomas "Kirei" Yuen and veteran Norwegian EMEA midlaner Erlend "Nukeduck" Våtevik Holm joined as academy assistant coach and LCS assistant coach.

Independent reporter Travis Gafford initially reported on Nov. 7 that Danish midlaner Soren "Bjergsen" Bjerg and American botlaner Yiliang "Doublelift" Peng would join 100T in 2023 along with Chinese jungler Mingyu "Spica" Lu. But according to Brieuc "LEC Wooloo" Seeger, Spica instead joined FlyQuest. On Nov. 19, Wooloo confirmed Doublelift and Bjergsen's moves, as well as Canadian toplaner Milan "Tenacity" Oleksij's promotion to the starting lineup and Turkish jungler Can "Closer" Çelik's retention of his spot on the team.

MAD Lions has not named a replacement for Kaas, but appear to be retaining head coach James "Mac" MacCormack, who has been with the team since December 2017, when they were known as Splyce.

Featured photo courtesy of 100 Thieves.