With an exciting Winter Major now behind us, we look forward to one more Major before the trial of them all, the World Championship (set to take place in Dallas). The Spring Split is sure to bring us even closer to the edge of our seats as teams compete for their last chance to qualify for international competition. North America is set to start April 24th (closed qualifiers).
The Rocket League World Championship.
— Rocket League Esports (@RLEsports) March 27, 2022
Will you be there to witness history? #RLCS pic.twitter.com/ZVGB2VT3EA
The rest of the 8 teams will come from open qualifiers, set to start April 22nd. Closed qualifiers will once again be in a Swiss format (the best format), and the top 8 teams will move on to the main event; set to premiere April 29nth – May 1st. These are the dates set for NA, MENA, OCE, and APAC S. You can see the starting dates for the other regions below, they will follow a similar seeding and formatting (you can see the current standings and rosters for each region here).
Event Schedule
- April 28 – 29: Middle East & North Africa (MENA) Regional #1
- April 29 – May 1: Verizon Ultra Cup (NA); Asia-Pacific South (APAC S), and Oceania (OCE) Regional #1
- May 6 – 8: Dacia Spring Cup (EU); Asia-Pacific North (APAC N), South America (SAM) Regional #1
- May 13 – 15: 7-Eleven Slurpee Cup (NA); APAC S, MENA, OCE Regional #2
- May 20 – 22: Tour de Rocket League (EU); APAC N, SAM Regional #2
- May 27 – 29: Regional #3 (NA), APAC S, MENA, OCE Regional #3
- June 3 – 5: APAC N, SAM Regional #3
- June 10 – 12: Super 16 (EU)
- June 29 – July 3: Spring Major
Broadcast Start Times | Spring Split
- Asia-Pacific North (APAC N) RLCS: 7 p.m. JST (3 a.m. PT)
- Asia-Pacific South (APAC S) RLCS: 5 p.m. SGT (2 a.m. PT), Fridays at 7 p.m. SGT (4 a.m. PT)
- European (EU) RLCS: 8 a.m. PT (3 p.m. UTC)
- Middle East & North Africa (MENA) RLCS: 8 p.m. KSA (8 a.m. PT) on April 28 – 29; 6 p.m. KSA (8 a.m. PT) all other dates
- North America (NA) RLCS: 10 a.m. PT (5 p.m. UTC)
- Oceanic (OCE) RLCS: 5 p.m. AEST (12 a.m. PT), Saturdays at 3 p.m. AEST (3 p.m. PT)
- South America (SAM) RLCS: 4 p.m. BRT (12 p.m. PT)
The main event (tune in here for news and analysis) will be your classic double elimination. No more fluffy group stages, it will start with a round of 16, you lose twice you are sent packing. Tune into team streams to view who you want to win (or lose). This means we may again observe a bracket reset.
Seeding
For seeding decisions regarding an RLCS Regional, Major, or World Championship, the following rules will be applied…
- Cumulative RLCS Points from the three most recent Tournament events, including both Regionals and Majors
- Cumulative RLCS Points
- The team with the better placement in the most recent stage of a Tournament event, followed by the most recent stage until a tie is broken. Outside of the stages within a Main Event, Day 3 of an Open Qualifier shall also be considered for seeding purposes.
Psyonix continues to reward teams with recent showings of improved skill as they increased point allocation for placements by 50. For example, whoever placed second in a Winter Major Regional got 300 points, now they will get 350. This is so that teams that are performing better at the current time have a greater shot at the World Championships. A team like Guild for example, who if they acquire marc_by_8 might suddenly have more skill than Dignitas, will be recognized for their improvement.
This Spring Split will be one for the books. Rosters are crazy, new rivalries have emerged, and those bubble teams only have one more chance to make it to Worlds. If you want to see who will be going head-to-head, check out my rosters and standings sheet here. Players will be competing for a flight (or train) to London where the Spring Major is set to be held in Copper Box Arena on June 29nth.
There you have it, if there is even a minuscule chance that you want to read my analysis of Regional 1, you can check out this page where I provide some insightful thoughts and strategy.