SicK to miss rest of Sentinels’ VCT Challengers run

Sentinels player Hunter ‘SicK’ Mims will miss the final two weeks of Valorant Champion Tour Stage 2 Challengers due to an “on-going family matter”.  The team’s coach, Shane ‘Rawkus’ Flaherty, will step in for the remainder of the competition.

Rawkus stepped in for the team last week in place of SicK in their 2-0 loss against OpTic Gaming along with Dani ‘Dani’ Hashweh, who replaced a sick Tyson ‘TenZ’ Ngo.

What role Rawkus will slot into has yet to be revealed as last week he played Initiators, but without Dani to pick up Controllers for smokes, the coach may pick up Brimstone and Omen for the team.

Sentinels will face FaZe Clan and Cloud9 in their final two matches of VCT Challengers. They are the only team still winless in the group stage, and a defeat to FaZe will most likely rule them out of contention for a playoff spot. In the event of a group stage exit, Sentinels may also miss out on a spot in the Last Chance Qualifier for Valorant Champions as they will have a maximum of 45 circuit points.

Sentinels forced to make changes again

This move is another in a host of changes for the Sentinels side. The team benched Jared ‘zombs’ Gitlin in April for Eric ‘Kanpeki’ Xu and moved their roles around to accommodate the new addition. SicK switched to a Controller role for Sentinels as Kanpeki slotted into an Initiator and Flex role.

On May 5, Sentinels ended their search for a new coach as they appointed Rawkus to the role on a permanent basis. The announcement came almost three months after negotiations between FaZe and Sentinels had broken down over buyout complications.

• Read More: “An anime aimer”: Meet Kanpeki, Sentinels’ newest Valorant signing

Sentinels have yet to see international play this year as they failed to qualify for VCT Stage 1 Masters by dropping out of the Stage 1 playoffs in the first round. In 2021, Sentinels qualified for every international event and won Stage 2 Masters Reykjavík.