The head coach of SK Telecom T1 Choi “cCarter” Byung-hoon explained that the team electing to bring Heo “Huni” Seung-hoon over Park “Untara” Eui-jin based on his “experience and ability to manage dangerous situations.”
In an interview with Fomos’ Choi Min-sook on Wednesday, cCarter explained the process of choosing Huni as the starting top laner and what traits he took into consideration that made Huni a better choice than Untara.
“They were both incredibly good players so making the decision was very difficult,” he said. “Unrelated to Huni’s performance in the LCK summer split finals, I valued his experience and ability to manage dangerous situations in-game. I also thought that the team would have better games with him at worlds.”
As SKT’s decision to bring Huni to worlds while Kang “Blank” Sun-gu occupied the spot of the team’s sixth man was a topic of conversation among fans of SKT regardless of region. When looking at the numbers, Untara arguably had a better split than Huni. Untara played 25 games during the regular season as opposed to Huni’s 16, had a better win rate by over 30 percent, and doubled Huni’s KDA. However cCarter must have seen something in Huni that can’t be expressed through numbers.
To Huni’s credit, he does have a more impressive career than Untara. Huni debuted in the 2015 season with Europe’s Fnatic, where he had a great a season and even played in the world championships that year by finishing first in that year’s summer split. He then moved to North America’s Immortals for 2016 where he had another impressive season although he didn’t return to worlds that year. Huni’s LCK spring split run with SKT was also nothing to sneeze at either, as he played a role in the team’s spring championship.
With SKT gearing up for a fourth world championship, fans will undoubtedly continue to focus on the team’s top lane, and depending on his performance, will doubt cCarter’s decision. SKT’s first opponent for the group stage of worlds will be Cloud9 on Oct. 5.