The 2016 NA LCS season was the fourth year of the North American ''League of Legends'' Championship Series. It was divided into spring and summer splits, each consisting of a regular season and playoff stage. Regular season games were played in the

Riot Games Riot Games, Inc. is an American video game developer, publisher, and esports tournament organizer based in Los Angeles. It was founded in September 2006 by Brandon Beck and Marc Merrill to develop ''League of Legends'' and went on to develop ...

Studios in Los Angeles, California.

Format

Teams compete in a double round robin tournament over the course of nine weeks during the regular season, with matches being best-of-three. The top six teams from the regular season advanced to the playoff stage, with the top two teams receiving a bye to the semifinals. The seventh place team qualifies for the next split of the LCS but does not participate in playoffs. The bottom three teams play in a promotion/relegation tournament against the top two NA Challenger Series teams. Playoffs were single-elimination and matches were best-of-five. The winner of the summer split automatically qualified for the 2016 World Championship, while the team with the most cumulative championship points from the spring and summer splits also qualified for World Championship. A final team, the winner of the regional finals, also qualified for the World Championship.

Offseason changes

As the team with the worst record in the 2015 NA LCS Summer regular season,

Team Dragon Knights Team Dragon Knights, briefly known as Team Arena Online, was an American professional ''League of Legends'' team. For most of its history the team competed in the North American ''League of Legends'' Challenger Series, but was briefly in the No ...

was automatically relegated to the NA Challenger Series. As the eighth and ninth team places respectively,

Team 8 Team 8 was a professional ''League of Legends ''League of Legends'' (''LoL'', commonly referred to as ''League'', is a multiplayer online battle arena video game developed and published by Riot Games. Inspired by ''Defense of the Ancients ...

and Enemy eSports were obligated to play in a promotion tournament against the second and third place Challenger teams, who were

Team Coast Team Bianchi was a makeshift team that was put together from the remnants of the Coast team in time for the 2003 Tour de France. Team Coast had been unable to pay the salaries of their riders and Bianchi took over the team and the role of ti ...

and Team Imagine respectively. Enemy was relegated after losing to Coast 3–0, but Team 8 beat Imagine 3–1 to remain in the LCS. The two teams that won the Promotion matches both sold their spots to other teams before the start of the spring split. The

LA Renegades Renegades is an American professional esports organization. It has teams competing in '' Call of Duty'', '' Counter-Strike: Global Offensive'', '' Fortnite'', '' Overwatch'', '' Super Smash Bros.'', '' Rocket League'', '' iRacing'' and ''Valor ...

were automatically promoted by winning the NA Challenger Series. A total of three teams, Team Coast, Team 8, and

Gravity Gaming Gravity Gaming (also known as Team Gravity) was a North American ''League of Legends'' team that competed in the North American League of Legends Championship Series (LCS). The team was originally known as Curse Academy and was the second team of ...

sold their NA LCS spots, all to new esports organizations that had been created for the sole purpose of being in the LCS. Team Coast sold their spot to

NRG eSports NRG Esports (or simply NRG) is an American esports organization based in Los Angeles, California. It has rosters in ''League of Legends'', ''Overwatch (video game), Overwatch'', ''Rocket League'', ''Valorant'', ''Counter-Strike 2'', ''Apex Legen ...

, Team 8 sold their spot to Immortals, and Gravity's spot was sold to

Echo Fox Echo Fox was an American esports organization. It was founded on December 18, 2015, by retired basketball player Rick Fox, who created Echo Fox after he purchased the NA LCS spot of Gravity Gaming. The organization had expanded into various ...

. Team Impulse had announced their intentions to sell their spot, but failed to do so prior to the original deadline. However, after the Spring Split, Team Impulse managed to sel it's spot to

Phoenix1 Sentinels is an American esports organization based in Los Angeles, California. The organization was founded as the ''League of Legends'' team Phoenix1 and competed in the North American League of Legends Championship Series (NA LCS). In June ...

just before the start of the Summer Split.

Spring

Regular season

Playoffs

The 2016 NA LCS Spring finals saw a rematch of the previous split's finals between

Team SoloMid TSM (initialism derived from the previous name Team SoloMid) is a professional esports organization based in the United States. It was founded in September 2009 by Andy Dinh, Andy "Reginald" Dinh. TSM currently fields players in ''Apex Legends' ...

and

Counter Logic Gaming Counter Logic Gaming (CLG) was an American esports organization headquartered in Los Angeles, California. It was founded in April 2010 by George "HotshotGG" Georgallidis and Alexander "Vodoo" Beutel as a ''League of Legends'' team, and branche ...

. The finals were played in

Las Vegas Las Vegas, colloquially referred to as Vegas, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Nevada and the county seat of Clark County. The Las Vegas Valley metropolitan area is the largest within the greater Mojave Desert, and second-l ...

Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a landlocked state in the Western United States. It borders Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. Nevada is the seventh-most extensive, th ...

at the

Mandalay Bay Events Center The Michelob Ultra Arena, formerly the Mandalay Bay Events Center, is a 12,000-seat multi-purpose indoor arena at the Mandalay Bay Resort and Casino, located on the Las Vegas Strip in Paradise, Nevada. It is owned and operated by MGM Resorts Int ...

Bracket

Promotion tournament

Summer

Regular season

Playoffs

The summer finals were held at the

Air Canada Centre Scotiabank Arena (SBA), formerly known as Air Canada Centre (ACC), is a multi-purposed arena located on Bay Street in downtown Toronto, Ontario, Canada. It is the home of the Toronto Raptors of the National Basketball Association (NBA) and t ...

in Toronto, Canada, the first time an NA LCS match had been played outside of the United States.

Bracket

Promotion tournament

Worlds qualification

Championship Points

Regional qualifier

Notes

References

External links

2016 Season Official Rules
{{League of Legends Championship Series League Championship Series (esports) seasons North American League of Legends Championship North American League of Legends Championship North American League of Legends Championship 2016 in Toronto