Despite an embarassing 2-0 loss to Cloud 9 in the first week of the Spring Split, Team SoloMid have adapted and come back strong. Their rematch against C9 was a hotly contested affair, with both teams gaining - and yielding - gold leads time and time again. Ultimately, TSM's superior teamfighting and midgame rotations allowed them to come out on top of their rivals, claiming the victory in three games.
This time around, Bjergsen really stepped up to the plate for TSM. From an Orianna pentakill in game 1 to diving the backline with Zed in game 3, Bjergsen did everything that TSM needed him to in order to come out on top. Even in game 2's loss, Bjergsen provided so much midgame pressure on Jayce that they might have been able to overcome Cloud 9 regardless. He closed out the series with a 22/4/10 KDA
Unlike in the last series, Cloud 9 weren't able to leverage their good early game rotations into midgame pressure. Though they had slight edges in games 1 and 3, TSM were able to barely keep up and find the one solid teamfight they needed to turn things around. Part of the problem was Cloud 9's incredibly squishy comps - without a tank, it was much harder for them to deal with Hauntzer's initiation or to start fights of their own. In fact, the one game that C9 won was when TSM drafted a squishy comp and Cloud 9 had a better frontline. Guess tanks are in.
Game 1 was Cloud 9's right up until a fight around drake. Seeing an opening, TSM pulled the trigger and picked off two, securing the drake as well. Suddenly on the back foot, Cloud 9 attempted to bully down the mid outer tower as well but were engaged upon by Hauntzer's incredibly tanky Maokai. A fantastic Command: Shockwave from Bjergsen let TSM pick up three from the fight, and then a Baron on the backside. Lacking the midgame pressure that they're used to, Cloud 9 had no hope against the empowered TSM squad.
The next game had almost the exact reverse opening - this time, TSM jumped to an early lead, spurred by an early gank by Svenskeren in the midlane for first blood onto Hai. With Bjergsen's Jayce doing massive poke damage to Cloud 9's squishies, C9 had no choice but to cede objectives. However, TSM stalled out in the midgame, as their comp lacked ways to start teamfights. With their comp reaching lategame, Cloud 9 slowly turned the tables around, taking Baron and an Elder Dragon on the backside of a teamfight. Bjergsen's Shock Blasts slowly became irrelevant, and Cloud 9 marched into their base to even up the series.
The final game saw Cloud 9 again grab an early lead, mostly thanks to Contractz's Kha'Zix picking up two back-to-back kills on Svenskeren in the jungle. Hai's Ekko meanwhile bullied out Bjergsen's Zed hard enough to claim the first tower blood in the midlane - not something that usually happens. However, TSM battled back with smart objective trades, somehow managing to stay in the game until Bjergsen could scale up. After that, it was a simple matter for TSM to execute dives onto C9's backline with the Zed/Shen combo - the ninjas were able to pick up kills on Sneaky and Smoothie again and again in fights. Despite Svenskeren giving a Baron steal over to Contractz, TSM were able to find the teamfight wins they needed to close out the game.
