The non-backed Bonkers team have announced their return for 2024, keeping three members from the previous season intact.
AUSTRALIA – Bonkers have announced their return to action with a brand new lineup ahead of the upcoming Challengers 2024 season, featuring both new and returning players.
The new-look squad has been put together with the intention of once again competing in the upper echelons of VALORANT via Ascension, much like their run throughout the 2023 season.
The team’s core that made it to the 2023 Ascension Pacific event has undergone changes with the inclusion of two new members, but three players from the previous iteration of the roster remain in Jackson “Minimise” White, Nicholas “DRAGON” Aleksandrovsky, and Luis “LEW” Hibbert.
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Bonkers were the only team that qualified for Ascension Pacific in Thailand without any organizational backing, ultimately securing a respectable 5-6th place finish in the playoffs and outperforming the likes of local representatives XERXIA, Korean powerhouse Dplus KIA, ONE Team Esports from Taiwan, and Indian-Filipino combine Orangutan.
After the conclusion of Ascension, in-game leader Minimise spent the last four months of the year competing with Royal Never Give Up, whereas DRAGON and LEW had a short stint with JiJieHao during that period.
Nick “tixx” Quinn is another alumni on his way to the new Bonkers roster, as the 21-year-old briefly represented the banner in early 2022, which marked the pinnacle of their success by reaching the VCT APAC Stage 1 Challengers event alongside Minimise. In the 2023 season, tixx competed in the South Asian circuit with India’s Gods Reign, standing out as one of the top performers in the entire competition while playing as a controller.
Rounding out the roster is former Team Weibo and ORDER member Elvin “Maple” Sun. Maple was a member of the ORDER squad that exerted dominance over the Oceania scene in 2021, initially slated to represent the region in the NA LCQ but could not attend due to logistical issues amid COVID. In more recent times, Maple dedicated a significant portion of 2023 to competing in China with Weibo, where he stood out as one of the team’s top-rated players, specializing as a duelist.
The presence of a coach standing behind Bonkers in the upcoming season remains under wraps at the time of writing.
Bonkers now have:
- 🇦🇺 Jackson “Minimise” White
- 🇦🇺 Nicholas “DRAGON” Aleksandrovsky
- 🇦🇺 Nick “tixx” Quinn
- 🇦🇺 Elvin “Maple” Sun
- 🇬🇧 Luis “LEW” Hibbert
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Cover photo courtesy of VCT Pacific
