While the LCS may not have had a strong showing yesterday, at least NA can brag about winning the show match. Jonathan “Westrice” Nguyen, Cloud9’s academy head coach, played a part in the win. But while his role isn’t usually on the rift, Westrice is also no stranger to the stage. He spent time as the top laner for compLexity before becoming a sub for C9.





With his mix of playing and coaching knowledge, Upcomer talked to Westrice about what it was like getting back on the stage, C9’s chances at Rift Rivals, and his thoughts on Scouting Grounds.





When you were still playing as a pro, you were a Top laner. Today in the show match, you were in the bottom lane on Ezreal. What was it like being on the back on the stage on an unfamiliar role?





Honestly, I was pretty nervous. Everyone else was too. Steve, Kobe, Andy, Dyrus⁠—They were all nervous. It’s been so long since we have all been on the stage. Like, we heard the white noise for the first time. I haven’t heard that in five years. It was pretty fun.





Now that NA has won the show match, obviously we’re going to win the rest of Rift Rivals. One of the Cloud9 coaches won, which means the team wins. That’s how that works, right?





Yeah, that’s exactly what it means. To be honest though, G2 is probably the best team in the world. They’ve proven it. I just really hope we can stand a chance against them.





I think everyone agrees that G2 is one of the best teams in the world if not the best. But how do you think Cloud9 stacks up against the teams from the LEC?





As long as Cloud9 plays to our strengths and we don’t follow how G2 plays or how any other team plays, then I really think we can get a win.





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You’re the Academy head coach for C9, and while thinking about, I realized that almost all of your teammates from when you were on compLexity have gone on to be coaches or analysts. What is it about that squad that made coaching a successful option for you all?





It’s not really that surprising to me. When you don’t have the motivation to play anymore, it’s pretty easy to transition to coaching. I don’t really know what Kez is up to anymore. I think he moved to a different game.





Most of us went to coaching. Most of us are pretty successful, like Pr0lly. If you feel like you’re not good enough at the game, you can always use your experience to mentor and help aspiring pros.





Cloud9 is one of the few orgs that has a really strong integration between their Academy team and their LCS roster. Specifically, C9 has a lot of LCS calibur players on the Academy team. How does it feel having that strong of a roster in the Academy league?





Some of these players, like GoldenGlue and Keith, are not new players. But like, Kumo, Diamond, and Blaber are all players we brought up from Scouting Grounds. And while they are LCS caliber now, they definitely didn’t start that way.





Riot seems to be dedicating a lot more resources into the collegiate scene. As an Academy coach who has been involved in Scouting Grounds, would you like to see better integration of the collegiate scene in to the Scouting Grounds system, or do you think the system is fine as is?





I think the current [system] is fine. I mean, I know that there is going to be more Scouting Grounds now that Faceit is running it. I think that system is pretty good. Because Scouting Grounds once a year is pretty inconvenient. I’ve wanted there to be more, and now that it is happening more often, I’m happy with it.





Last question, does playing on the stage today make you wish you were still an active pro?





Definitely not. No. [laughs] It’s definitely—it’s fun to play seriously once and a while. But playing for long periods of time? I don’t know if I could do that anymore.