Nick “Notiko” Celombitko is the Portuguese LoL champion. Together with his team GTZ Esports, the bot laner defeated the White Dragons in the final of the LPLOL in a best-of-five series.
Celombitko moved to the Portuguese league at the beginning of the year. The Hörstel native previously played for MyInsanity in the 2nd Division, the Strauss Prime League, before moving to the Portuguese top team.
With GZT Esports, he went into the Spring Split as one of the favorites for the title. A total of 8 teams took part in the Spring Split, the first Portuguese league, with the 4 best-placed teams qualifying for the playoffs. Celombitko and GZT Esports got off to a strong start in the split and only conceded their first game in the 4th game week. After 7 weeks and just two defeats, they finished the main round in first place. At the same time, Celombitko was named best player of the game twice.
As the first-placed team, Celombitko and his team faced the White Dragons, who had finished second in the main round, in the Upper Bracket final. The mode was now best-of-five, but they only needed three games to make it to the final. As fate would have it, they met the White Dragons again in the “final” final. Here too, Celombitko and co. left nothing to chance and dispatched their opponents with a quick 3:0.
Winning the Portuguese championship also means qualifying for the EU Masters Play-Ins. There they will face a French, Belgian and Arab representative in Group A. GZT Esports and Celombikto are certainly not without a chance here either, so qualification for the EU Masters is certainly realistic.
Nick “Notiko” Celombitko has been supported by the state of North Rhine-Westphalia and the esports player foundation as part of the Esports Academy NRW since January 2023. The support includes in-game coaching, sports psychology support, nutritional advice, regular boot camps, dual career planning and much more.