FlyQuest 1, OpTic Gaming 0
FlyQuest kicked off Sunday's Week 2 slate in the North American League of Legends Championship Series Summer Split by picking up its first win of the split against OpTic Gaming in Los Angeles.
FlyQuest (1-3) ran a gold funnel composition with AD carry Jason "WildTurtle" Tran's Lucian being swapped into the mid lane, where he created plenty of pressure as he bounced between middle and top lane and helped FlyQuest secure first turret gold and early kills. Despite the lead, though, teamfights were still close contests in the mid game as FlyQuest's grip on the game started to loosen. Some questionable engages from FlyQuest allowed OpTic Gaming to win some teamfights and go on a Baron power play that swung the gold lead in its favor. This began a strenuous back and forth between both teams, with each taking turns in the driver's seat.
Eventually, though, FlyQuest stood tall as its resource funnel onto WildTurtle paid off in late-game teamfights. Other members helped carry the team to victory, too. FlyQuest mid laner Jang "Keane" Lae-young, despite being pushed to the bottom lane carry role, shined as Taliyah and dished out the most damage to champions on FlyQuest on his way to an 83 percent kill participation.
In a Hail Mary attempt to swing the game late, OpTic mid laner Tristan "PowerOfEvil" Schrage's Talon desperately sought a flank onto WildTurtle, but his efforts backfired as he died and gave FlyQuest the numbers advantage that it needed to wrap up its first win of the split.
FlyQuest next takes on the Golden Guardians at 6 p.m. ET on Saturday, and OpTic Gaming will try to bounce back against Counter Logic Gaming at 7 p.m. ET later that day.
-- Ben Wong
100 Thieves 1, Cloud9 0
100 Thieves made it 2-0 on the week with a grind-out victory over Cloud9.
Looking at the massive lead that Cloud9 top laner Eric "Licorice" Ritchie's Fiora had, conventional wisdom would have dictated that Cloud9 (1-3) should have cruised a victory here. Add on a 6,000-gold lead at 26 minutes, and Cloud9 basically had everything it could have wanted in this matchup against 100 Thieves (2-2). Despite the top lane advantage, however, Cloud9 couldn't translate that lead into a win as 100 Thieves came storming back before long.
Simply put, Licorice's teammates let him down immensely during the 4-on-4 engagements in this game. Licorice had wholly dominated his lane and was sitting at a 5/0/0 KDA (kills/deaths/assists), but when Cloud9 got into a major skirmish in the top side jungle at 25 minutes, 100 Thieves ran away with the fight. That single fight ended up flipping the game on its head as 100 Thieves immediately went for the Baron with all the momentum on its side.
While Cloud9 continued to try and win the split-push game with Licorice, 100 Thieves was content to just keep winning 4-on-4 teamfights. All it took was another win at the 33-minute mark, and 100 Thieves wrapped up another Baron and moved right into the Cloud9 base to close out the game.
All members of 100 Thieves were certainly on top of their game in this game, but special mention has to go to AD carry Cody "Cody Sun" Sun's Kai'Sa, who finished the game with a stellar 8/0/2 KDA. With the win, 100 Thieves is back at .500 and looking to push back to the top of the NA LCS standings.
100 Thieves will now look forward to a matchup with Clutch Gaming at 7 p.m. ET on Saturday, and Cloud9 will open Week 3 against Team SoloMid earlier in the day at 4 p.m. ET.
-- Wyatt Donigan
Team Liquid 1, Team SoloMid 0
Team Liquid easily handled Team SoloMid in a game that lasted 29 minutes.
Though the total time of match was fairly lengthy match in the current meta, Liquid (3-1) was in control from the very start and was almost never in danger of losing this one against TSM (2-2). Liquid had an advantage from the outset as its team composition was well-suited to outscale and dominate TSM at every turn. With TSM relegating star mid laner Soren "Bjergsen" Bjerg to Lulu duty, the simple task of bringing the damage in teamfights quickly became a problem for TSM.
Liquid got on the board early, and often, with support Kim "Olleh" Joo-sung of all people securing the first two kills as Morgana. That was essentially a sign of things to come. Any objective that spawned on the map went the way of Liquid, including a Cloud Drake that Jake "Xmithie" Puchero's Sejuani stole right from under TSM's noses at 20 minutes. No matter the metric, be it kills, towers or dragons, Liquid owned a sizable advantage throughout the entirety of this game.
Once it was time for Liquid to pack things up and end the game, it secured the only Baron of the match while simultaneously acing TSM in a blink-and-you'll-miss-it fight above the Baron pit. That was the final nail in TSM's coffin as Liquid simply trotted up the mid lane and razed the remainder of TSM's base before the team could even spawn back onto the Rift.
TSM might have looked solid in Week 1 with a pair of solid wins but, now that it has faced two formidable opponents in Clutch Gaming and Liquid, the early split woes it experienced in the Spring are rushing right back. Liquid, meanwhile, look poised and ready to make another deep run this summer.
Liquid will hope to make it three straight victories when it takes on Echo Fox at 5 p.m. ET on Saturday, and TSM will look to stop its two-game skid against Cloud9 in the preceding game at 4 p.m. ET.
-- Donigan
Counter Logic Gaming 1, Clutch Gaming 0
Clutch Gaming put up a good fight but ultimately fell to Counter Logic Gaming.
Regardless of the meta, Counter Logic Gaming (2-2) will try to bring out Aurelion Sol once in a while for mid laner Choi "huhi" Jae-hyun. This game was a reminder of why huhi's Star Dragon should be feared, as he once again shined on his signature champion and bolstered his roughly 70 percent professional win rate. Roaming early and often, huhi maintained perfect kill participation for over 20 minutes and got CLG out to a quick lead.
CLG's other solo lane also excelled, with top laner Darshan "Darshan" Upadhyaya's Aatrox staying even with his mid laner in terms of kill participation early on as well as single-handedly winning teamfights. As CLG's lead grew, AD carry Trevor "Stixxay" Hayes also got in on the action as Kai'Sa and tore apart tanks in fights.
If anyone on Clutch Gaming (2-2) deserved to win, it was AD carry Apollo "Apollo" Price. Apollo's teamfighting on Lucian in this game was absolutely immaculate. He walked away with a sliver of health multiple times while putting out the maximum possible damage, even solo-killing his counterpart in the mid lane at 21 minutes. Unfortunately for Apollo, once CLG's perfect dragon control granted it a four-stack Elder Drake, followed by a Baron buff, he finally gave up a death as CLG ended the game in 42 minutes.
With both teams at an even 2-2 record, Clutch Gaming will look to break away from the middle of the pack against 100 Thieves on Saturday at 7 p.m. ET. Counter Logic Gaming will hope to do the same against OpTic Gaming at 9 p.m.
-- Brendan Hickey
Echo Fox 1, Golden Guardians 0
Despite a rough opening, Echo Fox took down Golden Guardians to close out Week 2.
Right off the bat, this bloodbath of a game looked as if it could end up being a stomp for Golden Guardians (2-2). Jungler Juan "Contractz" Garcia absolutely dominated the opening as Xin Zhao, ganking almost constantly to facilitate all seven of Golden Guardians' kills before the eight-minute mark. Ultimately, the greatest beneficiary was top laner Samson "Lourlo" Jackson on Camille, who started out 4/0/0 by working with his jungler.
Miraculously, this was not the end for Echo Fox. While it was behind, Echo Fox (3-1) had gotten a couple of trade kills along the way, and a shut down onto Lourlo helped keep the team within striking distance. Before long, Echo Fox brought itself even in gold despite a disastrous early game.
Once fully caught up, Echo Fox's immense teamfight potential began to shine through. With Yasuo, Galio and Braum, the team had plenty of hard engage, and that was backed up by additional area-of-effect damage from Vladimir and Graves. In particular, bottom lane carry Johnny "Altec" Ru was an absolute menace as Vladimir, with the combination of high ability power and magic penetration in his build punishing the Golden Guardians for failing to build almost any magic resistance.
As Echo Fox won teamfight after teamfight, Altec amassed a superb 9/1/6 KDA (kills/deaths/assists) before his team ended the game in under 35 minutes.
Having finally played a game with Heo "Huni" Seung-hoon in the top lane, it's possible that Echo Fox has settled down a bit in terms of role-swapping. We'll know for sure when the team takes on Team Liquid at 6 p.m. ET on Saturday. Later that day, Golden Guardians will take on FlyQuest at 8 p.m. ET.
-- Hickey