Divisions | |
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Founded | 2013 |
Based in | Helsinki, Finland |
Website | ence |
Ence (stylized as ENCE) is a Finnish esports organization with teams and players competing in Counter-Strike 2 , PUBG: Battlegrounds , StarCraft II , and NHL 22 . [1] [2] ENCE was founded in 2013 [3] and the organization takes inspiration for its name from the Enceladus of Greek mythology. [4] It is currently based in Helsinki [5] and is the most popular esports organization in Finland. [6] The organization also competed in Hearthstone and Overwatch until 2018, [7] [8] and in League of Legends for the 2020 season. [9] ENCE is best known for its success in Starcraft II and CS:GO. Serral was the first non-Korean to win a StarCraft II World Championship and the CS:GO team finished second at IEM Katowice Major 2019. [10] [11] [12]
ENCE was founded in 2013 and picked up a Finnish CS:GO team which competed in local tournaments. [13] In July 2014, the team disbanded after a series of disappointing results and did not return to CS:GO until 2016. [14] [15] The organization fielded multiple Finnish lineups for the next two years [16] [17] but did not have a stable roster until April 2018, when the organization signed Aleksi "allu" Jalli, Aleksi "Aleksib" Virolainen, Jani "Aerial" Jussila, Jere "sergej" Salo, and Sami "xseveN" Laasanen. [18] [19] The roster of young talent went on an unexpected Cinderella run at IEM Katowice Major 2019 before finally losing in the finals to Astralis. [18] [20] During the Major the team's unlikely success made them a fan favorite among neutrals and in Finland. [21] [22] [23] The Verkkars, a Finnish musical duo, released a song called "EZ4ENCE", titled after the team's chant; it references players, coaches, and team memes. [21] "EZ4ENCE" went viral in Finland during the tournament, eventually becoming the fourth-most-popular song in a Finnish top 50 published by Spotify. [24] The song would later be added into the game by Valve. [25] ENCE remained one of the top CS:GO teams in 2019, winning BLAST Pro Series Madrid and finishing second at DreamHack Masters Dallas and IEM Chicago. [26] [10]
IEM Katowice 2019 remains ENCE's best performance at a CS:GO Major, although they reached the playoff round of StarLadder Major: Berlin 2019 [27] and the semifinals of PGL Major Antwerp 2022. [28] [29]
The team's results worsened at the start of 2020 [30] and ENCE gradually replaced all of the players from the IEM Katowice run with an international roster. [31] [32] [33] In February 2022, with the release of Joonas "doto" Forss, ENCE's roster was completely non-Finnish for the first time in the organization's history. [34] [35] The team instead set up a Finnish academy team. [36] [37] Shortly after, ENCE partnered with ESL, receiving a guaranteed spot in the ESL Pro League. [38] The new roster has reached the top-5 of HLTV's world rankings. [39]
ENCE won their first trophy in over four years after beating MOUZ in the grand finals of IEM Dallas 2023, where Alvaro "SunPayus" Garcia would claim his first MVP title. [40] The team would continue their strong form with grand final appearances in their following two tournaments, IEM Cologne 2023 and Gamers8 2023. [41] [42]
ENCE also attended ESL Pro League Season 18, where they placed 3-4th after being eliminated in the semi-finals by MOUZ. [43]
On 26 November 2023, ENCE announced the departures of coach Eetu "sAw" Saha and in-game leader Marco "Snappi" Pfeiffer, who were replaced by Jakub "kuben" Gurczynski and Lukas "gla1ve" Rossander respectively. [44] [45] Later, on 16 December 2023, the team announced the departures of Alvaro "SunPayus" Garcia and Pavle "Maden" Bošković, who were signed by Saudi Arabian organization Team Falcons, along with Snappi the day prior. [46] [47] Heroic announced the signing of Guy "NertZ" Iluz on 17 December 2023, reducing ENCE's roster to only gla1ve and Paweł "dycha" Dycha. [48]
The same day, ENCE announced the signing of the Polish roster 9INE's core, consisting of Krzysztof "Goofy" Górski, Kacper "Kylar" Walukiewicz, and previous ENCE player Olek "hades" Miskiewicz. [49]
ENCE Counter-Strike 2 roster | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Players | Coaches | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Niclas "enkay J" Krumhorn | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
Legend:
| Roster updated 18 October 2024. |
Serral, a Finnish Zerg player, joined ENCE in October 2016 [50] and is one of the best players in the world. [51] [52] In 2018, Serral became the first non-Korean player to win a StarCraft II World Championship. [53]
Finnish player Erik "EKI" Tammenpää represents ENCE in NHL esports. [54] EKI is the most successful Finnish player in the game and one of the top players globally. [55] He was chosen by the Finnish Association of Sports Journalists as the 2021 Finnish esport athlete of the year. [56]
Ence rostered an Overwatch division from 2017 to 2018. In March 2024, the organization announced their return to Overwatch esports, competing in the Overwatch Champions Series. [57]
ENCE Overwatch 2 roster | |||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Players | Coaches | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
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William "Crimzo" Hernandez | ||||||||||||||||||||||||
Legend:
| Roster updated 5 May 2024. |
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