When fans think of Southeast Asia in esports, countries such as Phillipines, Indonesia and Malaysia. However, they rarely think of Laos, the home country of Souliya "JaCkky" Khoomphetsavong. The small Southeast Asian country is tucked away in the middle of Vietnam, Cambodia and Thailand. A small country that has never had esports as a focus, but produced one of the best carries in Southeast Asia. This is the story of JaCcky. 

JaCcky’s start in competitive Dota 

JaCcky started gaming just like any other person started, he started playing the game with his brothers and friends at university and quickly fell in love with the game. He would continue to rise the ranks before getting scouted and joining several local teams in early 2019. 

JaCcky is one of the later players to being playing professional Dota on BOOM Esports. In his first two years of competition he jumped around different teams such as 

ALPHA red, KPV gaming and Resurgence. He even had the chance to represent his home country in the 30th Southeast Asian games, where Laos lost to Thailand. 

When asked why Laos has a small gaming community, it comes down to the same issues of support and infrastructure to support esports. Even most of the Southeast Asian countries like the Philippines, Indonesia and Malaysia have only recently started supporting esports. The same might happen to Laos in a few years time. 

His rise with Mith.Trust 

Mith.Trust was the first big team that took a chance on JaCcky. The team from Thailand formed and would begin participating in a lot of tier 3 tournaments and playing in qualifiers for larger tournaments. 

As JaCcky was building a name for himself with Mith.Trust, he would get his opportunity to join an upper division team. T1 would reach out to JaCcky to add him to the team as their hard carry. He would play a few games for T1 in the first tour of the 2021 season. However, with every rise, there is a fall. As soon as JaCcky got his big opportunity, he would be replaced by Nuengnara "23savage" Teeramahanon just as fast. JaCcky would return to the lower division to play with Mith.Trust again. 

This time, JaCcky was set to prove that he deserved a spot in the upper division. Mith.Trust was promoted to the upper division with the help of JaCcky within the same season. Mith Trust was also able to find success in several independent tournaments such as the BTS Pro Series: Season Six and Mineski Masters. They scored first and second respectively in both those tournaments. At the end of the year, JaCcky could look at all his options and see what would be best for him. 

The start with BOOM Esports 

At the start of the 2022 season, JaCcky finally got his chance to start on a strong team. BOOM Esports picked him up as part of their brand new team. The moment this team got together they immediately went on a tear. They won the Southeast Asia regional finals against the team that released JaCcky a year earlier, T1. They also went on to place 1st and 2nd in the rest of the tours for the season. JaCcky also helped BOOM Esports secure their first International direct invite by placing top 8 in the most recent PGL Arlington Major. 

As one of the strongest carry players in the region, JaCcky will have to prove himself on the world stage along with his teammates. No matter what, it will be up to him to bring BOOM Esports to new heights as the team enters the International 11.