Sentinels replace Valorant coach kaplan with Ewok after Kickoff

A clause in a coach's contract sits at the center of the coaching change at Sentinels, one of the ten partner teams of the VCT Americas league. Sentinels announced that head coach Adam "kaplan" Kaplan has left the organization and that Martin "Ewok" van der Walt takes his place, Esports Insider reported on Monday, February 23, 2026, citing the team's press release and remarks by its chief executive, Rob Moore.

The change follows the 2026 VCT Americas Kickoff, the opening tournament of the regional season, in which Sentinels did not win a match. But the organization did not present it as a matter of results alone. Moore said the two sides disagreed on what the roster should look like, and that kaplan's contract gave him the last word on it. Sentinels has now decided that no future head coach will hold that power.

Esports Insider, February 23, 2026, from the Sentinels press release and Rob Moore's remarks on a live stream.

What Sentinels announced

Three decisions came together. The first is the departure of kaplan, who is now a free agent, meaning he is under contract with no team and may sign anywhere. The second is the arrival of Ewok as head coach, in time for VCT Americas Stage 1, the next part of the regional season. The third concerns a player: Amine "johnqt" Ouarid returns to the role of in-game leader, the player who calls the team's tactics during a match.

In the press release, as Esports Insider reported it, Moore said the organization does not take such decisions lightly, but does not believe in waiting once it is clear that it is on the wrong path. He described a problem that went beyond the scoreline. "What we saw at Kickoff wasn't just a results issue; the team wasn't developing the chemistry we needed," he said in the statement.

The stated aim is this season, not the next. According to the same report, Moore said the changes were made to give the team its best chance of qualifying for Champions 2026, the world championship that closes the Valorant year.

The disagreement behind the decision

Moore gave the detail outside the press release, while speaking on the live stream of Tarik "tarik" Celik, and Esports Insider reported his account. It concerns two players and two roles.

According to Moore, kaplan wanted to take the in-game leader role away from johnqt, something the player himself had never wanted, and to move Zachary "zekken" Patrone off the duelist role. A duelist is the player whose job is to enter a site first and open the fight for the rest of the team. The organization disagreed with both ideas. Moore said that kaplan had used zekken as duelist and johnqt as in-game leader in six of seven international events, and then planned to change both after Champions Paris, the world championship of the 2025 season.

The plan went ahead because of how the contract was written. Under it, Moore said, the head coach had the final say on roster decisions.

Sheep Esports had described the result of that plan before the season. In its preview of the Americas teams, published on January 14, 2026, the outlet wrote that johnqt had stepped away from the in-game leader role, that Kyu had taken over the team's strategic direction, and that johnqt stayed on the roster as a secondary voice. The same preview listed zekken as a signing of MIBR, another team of the league, and placed the move of another former Sentinels player, Zellsis, under Cloud9. Sentinels added cortezia, who came from MIBR.

Moore's account also covers the players' view. He said they themselves agreed that the team needed changes and was not on course to win international events.

A Kickoff without a win

The Kickoff opens the season of the VCT, the Valorant Champions Tour, the top circuit run by the game's publisher, Riot Games. The Americas edition ran for a full month, from January 15 to February 15, 2026, with 12 teams, the same number as the season before, according to Sheep Esports. Ten were partner teams: LOUD, Sentinels, NRG, MIBR, Leviatán, KRÜ Esports, FURIA, Evil Geniuses, 100 Thieves and Cloud9. Two came through Ascension, the circuit that sends new teams up to the international leagues: G2 Esports and ENVY, the latter taking the place held by 2GAME Esports.

Its format was forgiving. The Kickoff used a triple-elimination bracket, Sheep Esports wrote in its guide to the tournament, a format in which a team goes out only on its third defeat. Most matches were best-of-three, a series won by the first team to take two maps. The four teams that had played at Champions Paris entered in the second round, and the other eight started in the first. Only the final of each part of the bracket was a best-of-five, and no trophy was awarded. The three teams that finished at the top of the bracket qualified for Masters Santiago, the first international event of the year.

Sentinels did not use that margin. The team went winless, Esports Insider reported, and earned no Championship Points, the points that teams collect across the season and that count toward qualification for Champions. The outlet wrote that Sentinels now sits far behind the other teams in that count.

The outcome was not what the pre-season suggested. Sheep Esports wrote in early January that Sentinels was starting a new cycle with a substantially rebuilt roster, and its ranking of the 12 Americas teams, published the day before the first match, placed Sentinels fourth.

What Ewok brings from VCT Pacific

The new head coach arrives from another region. Ewok spent three years as head coach of RRQ in VCT Pacific, according to Esports Insider. VCT Pacific is another of the circuit's international leagues. In 2025 his team won the Stage 1 title there and finished second in Stage 2, and it qualified for Champions Paris.

Those results are the reason Sentinels gives for the choice. In the press release, as reported, Moore said Ewok has shown he can build a winning VCT roster, pointing to the Stage 1 title and the Champions qualification, and that he can build long-term improvement into the structure of a team.

The terms of his job differ from his predecessor's on the point that caused the split. Ewok joins as head coach, with Luke "GUNTER" Clives listed as assistant coach, but by Moore's own account the last word on who plays no longer belongs to the person in that seat.

The roster as it stands

Esports Insider listed the team after the announcement. It has five players and two coaches, and it is the same five who were listed by Sheep Esports before the Kickoff, with the leadership handed back to johnqt.

The list is not final. Moore said there would most likely be two more roster changes, and that trials, in which candidates play with the team before any contract is signed, would start on Tuesday. A trial is not a signing, and no name has been announced.

One role is open in particular. Moore said N4RRATE will no longer be the team's primary duelist. The job may go to reduxx, or to a duelist signed from outside.

The road to Champions Shanghai

The season leaves Sentinels little room to make up the ground. Its next competition is VCT Americas Stage 1, and the year ends with Champions Shanghai, the world championship of 2026.

Moore did not hide how narrow the path is. Esports Insider reported that he considers it likely that Sentinels will miss Champions Shanghai: qualifying on points from the team's current position would be very difficult, he said, so it would probably need a top-two finish to get there. He said there is a real chance the team misses Champions this year.

He also set a measure for the decision itself, and it reaches beyond 2026. If the team does not qualify for the first Masters event of 2027, Moore said, the changes will be considered a failure.

What comes next

VCT Americas Stage 1 begins on April 10, 2026, according to Esports Insider. That gives the new head coach a little under seven weeks from the announcement to settle a line-up that is still being tried out, with an in-game leader restored to his role and a duelist yet to be chosen.

Kaplan, for his part, leaves without a club. For Sentinels the trials come first, then the two changes Moore has said are likely.

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