Team History – iBUYPOWER Cosmic: Rocket League Division
From the moment Rocket League began to attract serious competitive attention in 2015, one North American roster sat at the center of nearly every conversation. Under the iBUYPOWER banner, that team became the first Rocket League Championship Series world champion, one of the first Rocket League rosters attached to a major endemic sponsor, and the bridge between the small SARPBC scene and a fully professional esport.
This Team History follows iBUYPOWER’s time in Rocket League only, from its roots in the Cosmic Aftershock lineup to the organization’s exit from the game after the 2016 world title.
Origins in SARPBC and the Birth of Cosmic Aftershock
Before the iBUYPOWER brand ever appeared on a Rocket League overlay, the players who would define the team were already building something important. In early June 2015, shortly before Rocket League’s full release, three veterans of Supersonic Acrobatic Rocket-Powered Battle-Cars created a new roster called Cosmic Aftershock. The founding trio of Kais “SadJunior” Zehri, Randy “Gibbs” Gibbons, and Cameron “Kronovi” Bills had already logged countless hours in the predecessor game and in the Rocket League beta, which gave them a deep understanding of aerial play, rotations, and boost management at a time when much of the scene was still learning the basics.
Cosmic Aftershock quickly turned that experience into results. Through late 2015 and early 2016 the team piled up wins and high finishes in the early ESL Go4RL North America cups and the RLC Pro League, as well as invitational events like the RGN 3v3 Cup. Those tournaments were small by later standards, but they set the tone for what “top level” Rocket League would look like: fast play, coordinated positioning, and deliberate aerial offense.
By the time Rocket League’s competitive space began to settle into regular weekly tournaments, Cosmic Aftershock already had a reputation as the best team in North America and arguably the world. Contemporary coverage remembered them as “the team” of the early Rocket League era, the roster that defined the skill ceiling in the months before any official league existed.
A New Kind of Sponsor: The iBUYPOWER Partnership
On October 30, 2015, Cosmic Aftershock crossed a threshold that no other Rocket League team had yet reached. Gaming PC builder iBUYPOWER signed and sponsored the roster, rebranding it as iBUYPOWER Cosmic and turning the previously independent trio into a team backed by a well known North American endemic hardware brand.
This move mattered for more than just a new logo and jerseys. At that point, Rocket League still sat on the edge between being a popular competitive title and being a true esport. Having a well known hardware brand attach itself to the top North American squad signaled that there was real commercial interest behind the game. Later features about the scene pointed back to iBUYPOWER Cosmic as one of the first Rocket League teams with genuine corporate sponsor backing, a “first wave” marker that other organizations would soon follow.
Under the iBUYPOWER name, the roster continued to perform. Through late 2015 they reached finals in Rocket Royale weekly events, won a North American 3v3 cup organized by RGN, and remained a constant presence near the top of any power ranking that tried to make sense of the new game.
Rebuilding for the Rocket League Championship Series
The announcement of the Rocket League Championship Series in March 2016 changed the stakes for iBUYPOWER. Psyonix’s new league promised an official structure built around two online qualification cycles and an international LAN final in Los Angeles with a fifty five thousand dollar prize pool. For a team that had dominated the grassroots era, it was the first opportunity to prove itself in a developer-backed world championship.
The path to that stage required hard roster decisions. On March 29, 2016, iBUYPOWER removed SadJunior from the starting lineup as the team prepared for RLCS season one. A few days later, on April 1, the organization brought in Cody “Gambit” Dover out of a brief retirement and added Canadian prodigy Brandon “Lachinio” Lachin. Gibbs stepped away from the field to become substitute and manager, a move that preserved his voice within the team while making room for a younger core.
The revamped roster of Gambit, Kronovi, and Lachinio quickly justified those changes. In April and May 2016 they claimed one of the early Rocket Royale weeks and earned a spot in the RLCS North American Group Stage. By mid May, an official RLCS update from Psyonix highlighted “IBUYPOWER COSMIC” as the number one seed in North America heading into the first round of group play, a sign of how firmly they sat atop the region.
That form carried into the first RLCS North American Online Final. In Psyonix’s recap of Qualifier One, the league described North America’s top ranked team, iBUYPOWER Cosmic, meeting second seed Kings of Urban in the regional final and winning the series four games to two to secure the NA share of the ten thousand dollar qualifier purse, with five thousand dollars awarded per region, and a strong foothold in the standings for the upcoming LAN.
By early summer 2016, there was little doubt that iBUYPOWER entered RLCS Season 1 as a favorite. What no one yet knew was that they would win the title with a different starting lineup than the one that had earned them the top seed.
A New Lineup on the Biggest Stage
The final twist in iBUYPOWER’s Rocket League story came only weeks before the world championship. On July 18, 2016, substitute Ted “0ver Zer0” Keil moved into the starting lineup when Gambit stepped away from competition for health reasons. The change left iBUYPOWER Cosmic with a three man core of Kronovi, Lachinio, and 0ver Zer0 heading into the most important matches of their careers.
On paper, that roster looked slightly less proven than the Gambit version that had conquered North America. In interviews given after the tournament, the team recalled that many observers considered them underdogs because they had lost a star player and were still adjusting to a new lineup.
The LAN itself told a different story. Over the weekend of August 6–7, 2016, eight teams from Europe and North America met at the Avalon Hollywood in Los Angeles for the first RLCS International Finals. The official league recap later described how iBUYPOWER Cosmic turned heads on day one by defeating European giants FlipSid3 Tactics in a tense opening series, then sending dark horse squad The Flying Dutchmen into the lower bracket.
On day two, they completed the run. In the upper bracket final iBUYPOWER beat top seeded Europeans Northern Gaming to claim the first spot in the grand final. Northern Gaming then fell again to FlipSid3 Tactics, setting up a rematch between iBUYPOWER and the European favorites.
The title series became the defining moment of the organization’s Rocket League history. The league’s recap noted that team captain Kronovi and “perennial all star” Lachinio were joined by late substitute 0ver Zer0, who turned in an MVP performance as iBUYPOWER defeated FlipSid3 Tactics four games to two in the best of seven final to claim the first RLCS championship.
That win did more than place a trophy in their hands. Guinness World Records later recognized iBUYPOWER Cosmic and its three starting players as the first Rocket League world champions, dating the achievement to August 7, 2016, in Los Angeles. Rocket League’s own official history of the RLCS likewise lists iBUYPOWER as the Season 1 winners, noting them as champions of a circuit that would continue to grow in prize pool, viewership, and global reach over the next decade.
Among fans, the run is just as often remembered for its signature play as for the scoreboard. Commentators and later articles frequently point back to 0ver Zer0’s solo air dribble in overtime, a goal that secured a finals berth and became one of the most replayed highlights from RLCS Season 1.
From iBUYPOWER to G2: The End of the Organization’s Rocket League Era
After the confetti fell in Los Angeles, a different kind of competition began. The first RLCS title immediately made iBUYPOWER Cosmic one of the most sought after rosters in the scene. In September 2016, exactly one month after their world championship win, European and North American outlets reported that League of Legends organization G2 Esports had acquired the entire lineup.
The move became official on September 7, 2016, when G2 announced that it had picked up the reigning Rocket League world champions. The roster of Kronovi, Lachinio, and 0ver Zer0 remained in place, with Gambit returning to work with the team and iBUYPOWER stepping aside as the title sponsor. From that date, community wikis list iBUYPOWER Cosmic as disbanded, with the players’ history continuing under the G2 name rather than the hardware brand.
For the iBUYPOWER organization, the transfer marked the end of its direct involvement in Rocket League. While iBUYPOWER remained a recognizable name in other esports titles, particularly Counter Strike, its time in Rocket League effectively began with the partnership with Cosmic Aftershock in October 2015 and ended when the world champion roster signed with G2 eleven months later.
Legacy and Place in Rocket League History
Measured purely in months, iBUYPOWER’s presence in Rocket League was brief. Measured in influence, it was foundational.
The partnership with Cosmic Aftershock showed that a new and relatively small esports title could attract a hardware sponsor willing to support a top roster. Later coverage of Rocket League’s growth routinely marked iBUYPOWER Cosmic as one of the first major corporate backed teams that proved Rocket League’s commercial potential to larger organizations.
On the field, the roster helped define what high level Rocket League looked like in its earliest era. From their days as Cosmic Aftershock through their RLCS Season 1 triumph, they blended SARPBC inspired aerial mechanics with emerging three man rotations, setting standards that other North American lineups had to match just to be competitive. Early tournament records from ESL, RLC Pro League, Rocket Royale, and RLCS qualifiers show the same pattern: iBUYPOWER at or near the top, week after week.
Their world title has also persisted as a reference point in later statistical and historical writing. When Rocket League fans compile lists of every 3v3 LAN champion or debate how to compare teams across eras, iBUYPOWER Cosmic’s undefeated series record at the Season 1 World Championship and their four to two grand final victory over FlipSid3 Tactics still appear as a benchmark.
Most of all, the short life of iBUYPOWER Cosmic encapsulates a particular moment in Rocket League history. In 2015 they were the archetype of a small scene superteam, built by friends who carried their experience from a niche predecessor game into a surprise breakout hit. By mid 2016 they had become one of the first Rocket League rosters with serious sponsor backing. By August they were the first RLCS world champions. By September they had been “poached” in full by one of the most recognizable brands in esports.
For iBUYPOWER as an organization, Rocket League was a single, sharply defined chapter: a bet on a new game, a partnership with the era’s dominant team, a world title, and then a graceful exit as a larger club took over. For Rocket League itself, that chapter helped turn a promising competitive game into a sport with a history, and it ensured that one sponsor’s name would always be attached to the very first line on the list of world champions.