Dziugss Rises to No. 1 in HLTV Prospects After Bucharest

Džiugas ‘dziugss’ Steponavičius moved to the top of HLTV’s April Prospects after his performance at PGL Bucharest. Kacper ‘xKacpersky’ Gabara, who had led the list since January, fell from No. 1. Bucharest MVP Nikita ‘cmtry’ Samolotov entered the top 10 and Liam ‘MaiL09’ Tügel climbed after a 1.21 rating on loan at Alliance.

HLTV revised the Prospects ranking for April, replacing z-scores with percentiles and fine-tuning the inputs to reduce large swings from small samples and limited LAN records. The new method assigns 45% weight to recent performance, 45% to offline and LAN pedigree, and 10% to outside measures such as scouting mentions. FACEIT ELO was added to capture strong results on third-party platforms before players accrue many official event stats.

The ranking now uses nine performance and context factors. These include a weighted rating against top-50 opponents over six months, a recency-weighted form rating, contributions to round wins, LAN rating, playoff rating adjusted by event tier, EVP points from notable events, age, frequency of mentions by established pros, and FACEIT ELO. Each factor adjusts for opponent strength and sample size so that high numbers from a handful of matches have less influence.

HLTV stated the change was driven by cases where players with few offline maps or limited matches against top teams rose quickly. Under the revised calculations, figures derived from small or remote samples move closer to the mean. As a result, Vyacheslav ‘slaxejezzz’ Vinokurov dropped after HLTV noted he had seven maps against top teams and no LAN record. Gleb ‘gr1ks’ Gazin also slipped; his high numbers versus lower-ranked teams remain in his Form and Round Win scores, but a limited LAN record reduced his overall rank.

The April list rewarded players who combined in-event impact with broader competitive samples. ‘dziugss’ rose after Bucharest, ‘cmtry’ entered the top 10 following his MVP showing, and ‘MaiL09’ benefited from strong FACEIT performance and recent match ratings while on loan at Alliance. HLTV said the weighted-rating calculations now better account for opponent difficulty over the previous six months.

HLTV also adjusted regional representation. The process now selects the top 40 global prospects, then fills the remaining 10 slots to ensure minimum regional representation: at least four players each from Asia and South America, two from North America, and one from Oceania. If regions already have players within the top 40, the final spots go to the next highest-ranked global prospects.

The coverage includes a profile of Alex ‘poiii’ Nyholm Sundgren, a teenager from Sweden now with 100 Thieves. He began playing early on 1.6 and Source, bought CS:GO at about eight or nine, and reached Global Elite in matchmaking before moving into higher-level mixes and local tournaments. He joined a development program and later received a salary with that squad, then moved to 100 Thieves where he retained aggressive rifling roles alongside William ‘sirah’ Kjærsgaard.

poiii recalled starting on a family PC and later saving to buy CS:GO. He left school shortly before joining the development program and said his parents supported him as long as he pursued a plan. He described keeping his previous roles at 100 Thieves and aiming to help the team qualify for larger events and a Major, while improving his own play.

An interactive dashboard normally shows the factor breakdown and individual scores for each prospect. HLTV noted that the dashboard is currently down for maintenance.