Knights GM says he wants to expand NA Challengers in 2024

The general manager for Knights Garett ‘Grt’ Bambrough said on an episode of The Wisemen that he would like to expand the number of teams in the NA Challengers League in 2024.

The North American Valorant Challengers League is set to start on February 1 after six teams qualified for the competition through open competition and six others were invited to play.

The teams that accrue the most points off of placement in the first and second splits, and mid-season tournament, of the league will participate in the Ascension tournament. Ascension will have the top two finishers earn a spot in the VCT international league.

How would Knights expand NA Challengers?

Knights, an esports organization that holds events and fields competitive rosters across multiple esports, runs the NA Challengers League and its general manager went on the Wisemen podcast to take questions about the upcoming season.

When asked about his thoughts on the league, Grt at one point said that he would want to have more teams in the competition next year.

“I want to look into expanding the number of teams in Challengers,” Grt said.

The general manager further explained that the field of teams could be expanded via Knight’s own tournament series it holds monthly in the region, or through the yet-to-be-released Premier Valorant system. Premier is an in-game path-to-pro tournament system that Riot Games is creating that will allow players to create their own team and face off against other aspiring pro players.

Grt explained that Challengers could add the top two teams from Premier, or the teams with the most points or wins in the Knights monthly events, for the next year. This way, according to him, pros that did not make the cut from NA Challengers in 2023, won’t have to wait for 2024 for meaningful competition.

Grt did not confirm that the expansion would happen, just that he is looking into if this is possible.