Three-time World Champion Bengi reunites with Faker as new T1 coach

Long-time SK Telecom (SKT) T1 fans can rejoice at the sight of a reunion between two League of Legends icons: Lee “Faker” Sang-hyeok and Bae “Bengi” Seong-woong. Bengi will now serve as part of the coaching staff for the main T1 roster, departing his role as head coach for the T1 Challengers side. Meanwhile, Faker will continue to play in the mid lane, marking a full decade with the org.

The addition of Bengi as T1 coach definitely takes us all back to the glory days of League‘s arguably most iconic lineup. It featured Faker, Bengi, Jeong “Impact” Eon-young, Chae “Piglet” Gwang-jin, Lee “PoohManDu” Jeong-hyeon. Newer fans may not be too familiar with these names, but they practically wrote themselves into the esports scene’s history. Still known as SKT T1 back then, the squad rampaged through Season 3 Worlds. No one stood a chance: the finals ended 3-0 in the LCK powerhouse’s favor. Even until now, T1 is the only org to have won the World Championship in back-to-back seasons in 2015 and 2016.

Despite Kang “Blank” Sun-gu becoming the preferred starter towards the end of Bengi’s tenure with SKT, he still played a significant role in T1’s phenomenal 2016 campaign—called upon at the brink of elimination during the semifinals—and helped lead the team to their third Worlds trophy.

While his glory days are now over, fans will be looking forward to how Bengi can assist the T1 coaching staff and get the org back to the pinnacle of League of Legends. He did a fairly solid job with T1 Challengers and got to coach some of Korea’s most promising young players. Working with the new roster, Bengi will also be mentoring mostly younger stars like Moon “Oner” Hyeon-joon and Lee “Gumayusi” Min-hyeong in the jungle and bot positions, respectively.

Aside from Bengi, T1’s staff includes Choi “Polt” Seong-hun, who re-signed with the team as general manager and head coach, as well as assistant coach Kim “Moment” Ji-hwan.