Dire Wolves Rebuild LoL Division With Former Pentanet.GG Trio

New Zealand League of Legends team Dire Wolves announced the signing of three new players on Thursday, December 15. As revealed, the new-look lineup will welcome a former Pentanet.GG trio in Jesse “Chazz” Mahoney, Mark “Praedyth” Lewis, and Daniel “Decoy” Ealam.

Dire Wolves announced a major roster overhaul for its LoL division on Thursday. As revealed on social media, Dire Wolves has completed the signing of former Pentanet.GG trio in mid laner Chazz, ADC Praedyth, and support Decoy. Besides the three signings, the Oceanic esports organization also struck a deal with support Rhett “Vxpir” Wiggins, who joins the team as substitute support.

As a part of the major roster change, Dire Wolves also waved goodbye to five members. The list of departees includes mid laner Lo “Siuman” Pak-man, top laner Joel “ShardBlade” Vekic, jungler Jordan “Praelus” Fernandes, ADC “Alvin “Dante” Jing Zhe Wong, and support “Drekani “Bulldog” Akuhata.

As a result, Dire Wolves enter the 2023 League of Legends season with only two carryovers in jungler Kim “Poltron” Nicholls and top laner Cameron “Zorenous” Abbott, who have been with the team since June and January 2022, respectively.

“We’ve put together a League team I think is really f—king solid,” said coach Joseph “Valixas” Tselios.

“Compared to last year—and don’t get me wrong, I love all those boys—we have a very vocal voice in Praedyth there now, and we’ve built around that completely.”

Valixas, who will be leading the Wolfpack in the 2023 season, will remain with the team and extend his stay for at least one more year. The Australian coach joined Dire Wolves in January 2022 to replace Poltron, who returned to pro play after spending just one split as the team’s head coach.

Whether the new-look roster will achieve the results Valixas believes is capable of remains to be seen, but there’s no denying that Dire Wolves now field a solid squad. With the right mix of young and hungry talent and veteran players, Dire Wolves should feel hopeful of improving upon their showings in 2022.

Dire Wolves initiated a complete roster rebuild following a fairly disappointing run through the 2022 season. Despite showing some promise, the Wolfpack couldn’t impress in League of Legends Circuit Oceania playoffs, placing fifth in Split 1 and Split 2.

In both playoffs, Dire Wolves crashed out of the first round with defeats against ORDER in Split 1 and Kanga Esports in Split 2. Moreover, Dire Wolves have managed 10-11 and 11-10 regular season records, respectively.

The 2022 season marked a huge drop-off for Dire Wolves, who were extremely competitive in 2021. Even though the Wolfpack did not win a trophy in 2021, they performed admirably well in the regular season.

Dire Wolves placed second in LCO 2021 Split 1 with a 10-4 record but then lost against PEACE (0-3) and Chiefs Esports Club (1-3) in the first round of the playoffs. Similarly, Dire Wolves played well in LCO 2021 Split 2, finishing in third place with a 14-7 record, but they couldn’t make it past Pentanet.GG (0-3) and PEACE (0-3) in the semifinals and finished the year in third place.

Now, Dire Wolves decided to freshen up the LoL division by signing some of the top talents from the region, namely the former Pentanet.GG trio, who are mostly known for their success at the 2021 Mid-Season Invitational.

Chazz, Praedyth, and Decoy also played a major role in Pentanet. GG’s success in 2020, helped the team finish LCO Split 1 in third and LCO Split 2 in second place, where they came two maps short of qualifying for the LoL World Championship.

We’ll get to see Dire Wolves’ new roster in action with the start of LCO 2023 Split 1, which is slated to begin sometime in late January.