Chinese pro player dominates Champions Queue game ahead of Worlds debut

Top Esports’ mid laner Zhou ‘Knight’ Ding has already been taking the competition by storm at Worlds 2022 – and he hasn’t even played his first game on stage yet.

As the 2022 World Championship continues in North America, the real international event of the year is taking place right underneath our noses: international Champions Queue.

Champions Queue is a closed North American LoL server designed to create a more conducive practice environment for NA pro players. And recently, it has been taken over by visiting professionals from all regions in the lead-up to the Worlds group stage.

We’ve seen some incredible matchups come out of Champions Queue. And while there have been questions surrounding its efficacy and rule implementation from members of the community, where else would you get to see one of the world’s best mid laners get 33 kills on Sylas?

Because that’s what happened on October 7, when Top Esports mid laner Zhou ‘Knight’ Ding put on a Sylas masterclass in a Champion’s Queue game alongside players like Gen.G’s Park ‘Ruler’ Jae-hyuk, G2’s Viktor ‘Flakked’ Lirola, and Team Liquid’s Samson ‘Lourlo’ Jackson.

A KDA for the ages

In the game, Knight went 33/3/8, doing 92,819 damage throughout the 28-minute victory. That averages out at about 3300 damage per minute — almost four times the highest average DPM of any Worlds player so far at the tournament.

Sylas has been the most popular mid laner at Worlds so far. Throughout the group stage, he was picked 18 times, and banned 21 — making him the second most popular champion at the tournament so far after Aatrox.

Knight’s proven he’s more than capable of taking over a game from the mid lane. And that’ll serve him well in Group C, where he’ll be facing off against DRX’s Kim ‘Zeka’ Geon-woo, who (statistically speaking) was the best-performing mid laner of the play-in stage.

Top Esports’ first match versus DRX will take place on October 16.