Kindred remains disabled, Jhin recently enabled, and the ROX Tigers look completely unstoppable, lets get into pseudo super week 6.
KT Rolster vs. Jin Air Greenwings
In game one KT take a mix of splitpush, pick, and team fighting champions. They are a bit all over the place with multiple win conditions. Problem is, they don’t do any particularly well. On the other side of the rift, JAG pick up scaling and siege - the goal being to take turrets in the late game. Bit of a back and forth trading in-game. Hachani, KT support, gets caught out deep warding completely alone allowing JAG to take first blood and a dragon. With such a great lead early on a scaling comp, Jin Air is able to quite easily snowball into a pick, dragon, baron, and an ace. Despite the overwhelming odds, Rolster fights back! They steal a baron and get a few kills. However, the comeback ends as soon as it starts as JAG get their second 5th dragon. Feeling the burn, KT crumble and JAG take the first game of this series.
What is KT doing?!? Rammus top and Rumble in the jungle? Never mind we haven’t seen these champions in forever, but to position swap seems ludicrous. KT wrap up the composition with a few more team fighting picks. Jin Air, whom were completely baited into their comp, have the triple attack damage poke and siege. Incredibly counter drafting by KT Rolster. Things go about as well as you would expect with this devastating teamfight/counter pick composition. It’s not fast by any means, but KT take the slow and steady route for the win.
More strange picks, this time however JAG jumps in on the fun with a Rumble jungle for themselves. KT then take Kogmaw, I don’t even know what’s going on anymore. Both look to team fight in the mid/late game. Surprisingly uneventful match. A few picks in the early game puts Jin Air in the lead and they push their lead relentlessly to eventually win the game and the series.
Incredibly strange draft by SSG, it’s what I like to call a gambit. Not like the team, more like the roll of the dice. No clear win condition, just hopes and dreams. On the other hand, CJ go for the tried and true wave clear and team fight. Very quickly MinHo "Crown" Lee, SSG midlaner, shows his phenomenal Leblanc prowess by getting 2 early solo kills on the opposing Viktor. He goes on to rack up the kill count while the rest of his team push for objectives across the map. Great pressure and an insurmountable gold lead wins Samsung the game.
In game 2 CJ go for a more poke and siege team while SSG look to team fight. What a brutally long and strange game. We start things off with Entus taking the early lead from a few kills and some dragons. Closer to the mid game CJ push their lead by scoring a 3-0 in a fight and transitioning smoothly into a baron. However, Samsung fight back and claw their way back into the game. They start this chain events by stopping a baron attempt and getting 3 kills for only one death. After winning another small skirmish, SSG do baron, dragon, and get a 4-1. The comeback is real. For about 10 minutes both teams dance around each other waiting for the opposite to make a mistake. Finally, after a grueling 56 minutes, CJ Entus simply rush the enemy base for the win. Notably fantastic performance by MinGi "Madlife" Hong's Bard.
In this final match of the day Samsung takes the team fight archetype and CJ the splitpush version. Thankfully a quick match to cap off two series each going to a grueling three games. For about 15 minutes it’s literally dead even with equal control of the map. A bit past this, SeongJin "Cuvee" Lee, SSG toplaner, on that Lissandra homeguard flanks the fleeing CJ Entus for a double kill which spirals into a baron. After only a few minutes of sieging, Samsung takes the game and the series in 27 minutes.
SK Telecom vs. Longzhu
Haha, oh man this series. If ‘Seong-Ung "Bengi" Bae on Udyr’ doesn’t make you drop everything to watch I don’t know what will. Enforcing this Udyr pick SKT look to 1-3-1 splitpush. It’s terrifying if pulled off perfectly, otherwise you’ve got a train wreck. Longzhu don’t opt into the antics, instead, going for a standard team fight comp. Awful start for SKT as JunSik "Bang" Bae gives up first blood to the enemy Kogmaw of all things! In the early game LZ take a bit of lead and control, as expected from the mid game SKT in general and with their composition. During the mid game not much at all happe- I blinked and SKT ace LZ for what seems to be the win. They charge down the mid lane, taking down all structures in the way, and start to whittle down the nexus when Longzhu revive just barely in time to stop the telecoms. Funnily enough the base defender becomes the attacker in a single swift motion, how about that? Longzhu storm the mid lane, as SKT did before, except they are actually able to finish the game.
More Udyr! It worked so well before. Similar win conditions as the previous game. Surprisingly, or not, Sang-hyeok "Faker" Lee overextends in lane and dies. That’s the price for lane pressure I suppose. Off the back of this, Longzhu are able to efficiently snowball their lead into multiple won team fights and objectives. Unable to handle the suffocating pressure, SKT are forced to crumble resulting in the loss of the game, and the series. Sucks that SKT threw T0M to the wayside, not only does he play a mean Udyr but generally he was pretty good - better than whomever the current sub is at least.
Looking to light things up EMF takes a more team fight route to winning while AF skews a bit in the siege department. Incredibly silly early game. Complete clown fiesta with the back and forth trades or pushes. Towards the mid game even more antics go down as both teams opt into a bloodbath at dragon, a baron gets stolen, and leads are thrown. This is a fantastic example of a low ranked team versus another low ranked team, eerily reminiscent of NA/EU games. Despite the fight put up by EMF, AF are generally a bit better and are able to eventually push for the win.
Both go for full on team fight comps this time! You know what that means? Skirmishes, skirmishes everywhere. Needless to say a bizarre 2 for 3 trade in the blue jungle leads to absolutely nothing. More shenanigans pop up around the map but once again, Afreeca Freecs take the lead in the mid game and push for the win.
KT Rolster vs. CJ Entus
Hard engage pick up by KT and a standard team fight comp for CJ. A superb draft of clear win conditions for both teams. Rolster take the lead early and it only grows when CJ’s jungler hilariously tries to steal dragon, plops down a terrible ultimate, then the rest of his team is slaughtered for attempting to help. Couldn’t help but to break out in laughter at that one, so bad. After an ace and a dragon CJ somewhat look to comeback but are crushed by the iconic Lissandra homeguard teleport flank complete with a full rotations of spells, otherwise known as getting reKT.
In game 2, both take well rounded team fight compositions. This one starts early with a disastrous start for KT. So much so, CJ actually take the lead which they are able to snowball into unanswered kills and objectives. Over at dragon KT mistakenly attempt to contest, but are utterly destroyed in a team fight. Not even CJ can toss such a lead, they eventually push for the win.
Both teams have fairly strange picks in this 3rd match, CJ with a sort of splitpush team fight and KT with triple ad. Largely uneventful game to cap this series. KT went for playing the long game: get 5 dragons and slowly push turrets, generally the distinct lack of any risk taking – they really wanted to win.
Jin Air Greenwings vs. ROX Tigers
The series I’ve been looking forward to! Possibly a glimpse into what the spring finals will look like as these are the two best, uncontested, teams in the LCK right now. For game 1 both take up well rounded team fighting comps. This wouldn’t be a ROX Tigers game without WangHo "Peanut" Yun getting first blood now would it? This helps put them in the lead just a bit but is quickly overwritten when BeomHyeon "Gorilla" Gang makes a poor engage in the enemy jungle which Jin Air are able to punish swinging control into their favor. Despite the major setback ROX apply the pressure which nets them a crucial baron, of which they started without Peanut’s smite – oops! On the next objective spawn the Tigers handily pick up another baron and win game 1.
Complete drafting counter by the ROX Tigers as they take hyper engage while Jin Air attempts triple ad. The triple ad will attempt to poke from afar, but all these pick oriented champions are wrecking that back line. Unfortunately awful tower dive by the Tigers allows the enemy Gangplank to pick up 2 kills early, this very well could’ve spelled their doom. To make matters worse, SeoHaeng "Kur0" Lee gets caught out then the rest of his team overstay leading to an ace. A bit down the line JAG get a dragon and a kill but are somehow still behind in gold. Late game ROX does what late game ROX does, they skirmish where they want, when they want, then steamroll the rest of the opposition. Messy matches from both sides.
Easy 2 game series and we move on right? Hah. Triple ad for SKT, team fight for AF. YeongMin "Mickey" Song, the Faker of lower tiered teams, does what midlaners can only dream of: he solo kills Faker, you know him, this Faker guy… 2 time world champion or whatever. Were I Mickey I would get one of those digital picture frames and showcase that clip over and over again right next to my bed. Over at top lane, SKT makes a standard tower dive but lose everything when Mickey, on Twisted Fate, pulls out the gold card for some phenomenal target acquisition stuns. A lot of TF’s in soloque would simply gold card whomever is closet at the time of the gate, Mickey however waits for just the right moment to hit a high value mark. Afreeca look to even win, but make a terrible baron call which pretty much ends the game right then and there.
SK Telecom pulls back out that triple ad while Afreeca Freecs take a strange gambit comp, their picks are completely all over the place. What’s funny about this game is that SKT have total domination in each and every lane, but thing is, they hardly ever have the early lead *cough* Because Bengi’s a bad early jungler. *cough* *cough* despite this, they usually win late game. This match is the exact opposite. They control the early game with an iron fist but completely flub the mid to late game. Well, it’s a bit more accurate to say Afreeca were playing out of their minds with fantastic engages and picks, notably Mickey and TaeYu "Lira" Nam played like a top tier team today. One last fight with a Kassadin engage, of all things, puts the final nail in the coffin bringing this series to an unexpected 3 games.
Afreeca take a splitpush win condition and SKT with, quite frankly, an awful draft. It seems like everyone just played whatever they wanted; what’s a Lulu going to do with Poppy, Ezreal, and Graves? I was appalled to discover Lucian fell all the way through picks and bans. By this point SKT are tilted off the face of the earth, they let AF take control early and never really attempt to take it back. Afreeca are so far ahead they manage to get a baron at 23 minutes, insane. SKT gave up and AF win what seems like the best series of their career, they certainly acted like they won worlds there at the end.
Final series of this long week, SSB go for an uber pick comp much like ROX Tigers did previously, however SSG is having none of these antics, they opt for standard team fight.
Crown gets 2 kills early on Leblanc, game over. Too bad you can’t surrender at 10 minutes, they should make an exception just for SBENU. Just at a base level their mechanics and team play in this match was embarrassing. I know they are the worst team in the LCK but man, complete garbage. For example, they try to kill the Lissandra, Malphite opens with his ult which is fine but then Nocturne follows immediately after. You know what that Lissandra is going to do? ‘E’ away to safety, not even a flash burned for two ultimates. It wasn’t even funny, just sad.
Nothing of interesting happens in game 2, Samsung pull of the time honored strategy used in solo que: just wait for the enemy to outplay themselves.
Looking Back
What a week! Overall: disappointing. The ROX Tigers vs. Jin Air game was appallingly awful and riddled with mistakes, SKT lost a metric ton of respect, SBENU is one of the worst teams I’ve ever seen (notable exception JeongHyeon "Nuclear" Shin), and even KT played relatively poorly. The only good thing to come out of this week was all the cool new picks. (Get it? Like pick comp but also literal champion picks. I’m here all week.)
