Divisions League of Legends | Founded 2014 | |
Location Los Angeles Metropolitan Area Manager Sean "PurpleForest" Shim
Toby Kwon Partners Micro-Star International | ||
Team Arena Online, previously known as Team Dragon Knights (TDK), is a professional League of Legends team that plays in the North American League of Legends Challenger Series (CS). The team spent the 2015 Summer Split in the League of Legends Championship Series before being relegated. Team Dragon Knights formed in September 2014.
History
The team was formed in September 2014 by manager Sean Shim. They qualified for the ESL LCS Expansion Tournament on via the Challenger ladder but did not participate in the tournament. However, after undergoing a number of roster changes they qualified for the spring season of North American Challenger Series, beating Team Frostbite and Storm in the qualifier. In the Challenger Series (CS), which took place from February 17 through March 28, TDK placed second in the season with a 7-3 record, behind Enemy eSports. In the playoffs, which ran from March 31 through April 1, they beat Team Fusion 2-1 before losing to Enemy 1-3, sending them to the Summer Promotion Tournament.
Despite the fact that they had placed higher than Fusion, Winterfox chose to play them in their LCS relegation match on April 26. Prior to the match, mid laner Kyle chose to retire. TDK used temporary substitute mid laner Alex Ich from Misfits in the matches and won in a 3-1 upset, successfully qualifying for the 2015 NA LCS Summer Split. After the match Alex Ich chose to remain with his previous team. TDK attempted to buy out Altec's contract from Winterfox as Altec was planning on leaving the team, however he chose to join Gravity Gaming instead.
On May 18 Dragon Knights announced their summer split final roster, consisting of Seraph, Kez, Ninja, Emperor, and Smoothie. The team went on a seven-game losing streak when they were unable to use Emperor and Ninja on the starting roster because of delayed visas. They finished the LCS summer split in last place with a 3-15 record, eliminating them from the playoffs and relegating them back to the Challenger Series. On September 23 the team announced it would be renamed as Team Arena Online after new sponsor Arena Online, a tournament organizing company based in Houston, Texas.