📝 Comeback Contenders: Team CC 2025 OWCS World Finals Preview

When looking at the roster for Team CC, many individual names stand out. All players — with the exception of Chen "BILIDENG" Cheng — had played in the Overwatch League across the various Chinese teams.

However, while many of these players had played in the League, there were very limited opportunities to play in the final years in the Eastern Region. Oftentimes, these players were outright unable to play in either the League or Contenders due to the NetEase deal temporarily taking Overwatch 2 servers down in China.

When competition reopened in China at the start of the year, many players returned to international competition. Although there was a lot of excitement for the return of former Chinese talent, analysts had placed Once Again and ROC Esports as the two definitive best teams in China.

Team CC was seen as the third best team, but many assumed third place would be their peak throughout the season. Unlike ROC or Once Again — who later signed with Weibo Gaming — Team CC is not an established organization, and instead relies on funding from individual sponsors and one of their player’s personal funds.

In the Stage 1 Group Stage, Team CC came in to make a statement: they reverse-swept ROC Esports and earned the No. 1 seed in their group, bypassing playing Once Again first in the Single Elimination Bracket. This was a huge result, as the victor in this battle would be primed to take the second LAN spot at the Champions Clash in China.

This was the first major achievement for Team CC in 2025. As previously mentioned, many analysts had assumed they would be firmly behind ROC in the power rankings, just outside the Top 2. Now, they have proved they can make it to an international competition.

When Stage 2 began, BILIDENG had joined the team and helped Team CC go 6-1 in the regular season. And as the Regional Playoffs began, they defeated ROC Esports again to qualify for the Midseason Championship.

While they weren’t able to make it out of the Group Stage at the LAN, they managed to take Geekay Esports all the way to five maps — and would have won the series had a few more teamfights gone their way. Despite the loss, this performance against one of the best teams in the world continued their journey to prove there is more than one team in China that can compete on an international stage.

In Stage 3, Team CC would be battling once more for the 2nd spot in China and securing that all-important LAN qualification. While their regular season was slightly weaker at 5-2, their Regional Playoff run was the best it had been all season long. They not only defeated their rivals one more time, but Team CC was the only team in China all season long to take Weibo Gaming to 6 maps in the finals, including leading 2-1 at one point/.

With their qualification to Stockholm, Team CC enters an exclusive club: they are now one of five teams to have qualified for every international LAN in the 2025 Season. This is a massive accomplishment for the players and the team — especially considering they are the only roster in the World Finals not represented by a formal organization.

This season has proven the DPS capabilities of both Li "Pineapple" Zhuo and Liu "Kaneki" Nian. While these players had played on the Hangzhou Spark and Chengdu Hunters, respectively, in the Overwatch League, they were not able to fully showcase their true might. Now, here on Team CC, both players have demonstrated great flexibility. Kaneki on the Flex DPS options like Tracer, Genji, and Symmetra, and Pineapple performing not just on hitscan but showing good flexibility on Sombra when needed.

Behind them is the reliable backline of Wu "Superich/Haoyoqian" Gengtuo and Cao "Farway2025" Jiale. While Team CC did have another support player with Ren "Unkn0w" Yanchao, Haoyoqian returned from his brief stint as coach to help level up their support compositions. Both support players have demonstrated high-level executions of backlines ranging from Lucio-Kirko, Ana-Wuyang, and even flexing over to heroes like Juno whenever needed.

But arguably the biggest breakout star this year has been BILIDENG. While initially Qiu "GA9A" Jiaxin had the starting spot in Stage 1, both he and coach Zhang "LnlD" Shukun saw the potential of BILIDENG could bring to their roster. China has stagnated in recent years due to the NetEase situation, so when a promising rookie entered the region, LnlD and GA9A knew this up-and-coming tank could become a world-class threat.


As GA9A has taken more of a coaching role, this has allowed BILIDENG to come in full force during Stage 2 and truly explode in Stage 3. With good executions of Hazard, Zarya, and D.Va, this team has been able to quickly adapt to the changing meta and was a big factor in their 6-map series against Weibo Gaming.

When the Overwatch 2 servers went down in 2022, many Chinese players were unable to truly showcase their talents in the game. Despite this, these players still had the drive to compete and perform to the best of their abilities. Heading into the World Finals, many are watching this team with extra curiosity. Although they are likely to fall to their first round opponent, T1, this is the same roster that took Geekay Esports to the distance at the previous tournament.

As an orgless team in a region still recovering from an esports drought, Team CC have faced many challenges. Currently, they are bootcamping in China and playing high-ping scrims with teams in Europe to compensate for a lack of nearby scrim partners. The odds are stacked against them, but the Stage 3 Finals were the best Team CC have looked all year. So don’t overlook these underdogs — they might pull off an upset or two.