<
>

Echo Fox picks up lead over Liquid

Yuri “Keith” Jew Provided by Riot Games

Echo Fox separated itself further from the bottom of the standings with a 2-1 victory over Team Liquid on Saturday during Week 5, Day 2 of the North American League of Legends Championship Series Summer Split in Los Angeles.

There was very little action in Game 1, with only seven kills total in 33 minutes of play. This suited Echo Fox (4-5, 10-11 combat record) perfectly, as its dual scaling carries of Corki for mid laner Henrik "Froggen" Hansen and Tristana for AD carry Yuri "Keith" Jew had plenty of time to get rolling. Froggen in particular had remarkable CS numbers of over 11 per minute on average. Team Liquid (2-7, 6-16 combat record) barely put up a fight this game, allowing Echo Fox's two marksmen to take objectives with ease, ending the game with four Liquid members alive without so much as a teamfight.

Game 2 was all about the Galio of TL mid Greyson "Goldenglue" Gilmer. Eager to make a case for himself after being subbed out in recent weeks, Goldenglue started off fantastically with a triple kill in a river skirmish just six minutes in. From there, he made great use of both Teleport and Heroic Entrance to maintain a presence around the map and perfect kill participation for most of the game. Meanwhile, Chae "Piglet" Gwang-jin's Kalista picked up kill after kill in fights, going 7/0/2 KDA (kills/deaths/assists) by the time Liquid took the game in under 29 minutes.

Unfortunately for Team Liquid, Game 3 was practically a carbon copy of Game 1. Another slow early game lent itself to Froggen's Corki and Keith's Caitlyn, as Echo Fox took an incremental but significant lead in objectives. After a pair of Barons, Echo Fox was up 10,000 gold and had two marksmen at five items each. This made it all too easy for Echo Fox to close out the series in 37 minutes, finding five of its nine kills in the last minute of play.

Echo Fox will hope to continue its upwards trajectory against FlyQuest on Sunday at 3 p.m. ET. Meanwhile, Team Liquid will have its work cut out for it against Counter Logic Gaming later that day at 6 p.m ET.