It’s February 21, 2019, and the five members of ITZY are standing on the stage of one of the most popular music shows in Korea, M Countdown, staring breathless at the screen as the numbers tally up to determine the week’s winner.

The group stands stock-still, heavy tension in their shoulders. The final count starts tallying numbers in various categories: digital sales, physical album sales, social media scores, online pre-voting, broadcast scores, and live votes, all metrics that aim to put a number on influence, on legacy. Lia, the group’s baby-faced 19-year old vocalist, takes a deep breath and grabs onto leader Yeji and the group’s rapper and dancer Ryujin.

Moments later — just nine days after debut — ITZY earned their first music show win for debut track “Dalla Dalla,” becoming the fastest girl-group in the industry history to do so. Audiences watched as the members, visibly flustered and teary-eyed, said the first of what would ultimately be many thank yous, after many wins.

Now, just over a year after their debut, ITZY has made being proud of who they are their ultimate ethos, with an enviable list of accomplishments to their name. Peaking at No. 2 on the Billboard World Digital Song Sales Charts, “Dalla Dalla” registered 17.1 million "day-of" views on YouTube, breaking the record for the most viewed K-pop debut music video in history, according to Billboard. At the 2020 Korean Music Awards, ITZY earned two nominations — Best Pop Song and Rookie Of The Year — and the group was one of the few idol acts in the list, a feat they achieved by establishing themselves as a Gen Z K-pop group for whom self-expression and identity trump coming off as “likeable” or “soft-spoken,” as their fierce songs clarify.

And so they have the numbers, they have the wins. But part of ITZY’s magic is that as a concept, they can stand apart from those things. ITZY has ridden in on a platform of self-love, of not letting outside forces define you. No matter how much you stand out from the crowd, they say, it’s OK that “the kids and I are different,” as they sing on “Dalla Dalla.” The early music show victory reinforced to the industry that they’re a group to watch — but they’ve known that what they worked for and what they believed in mattered all along.