With caution and care, Evil Geniuses chipped away at LGD's towers to eliminate the Chinese team in fourth place from The Summit 3. EG is set to face the loser of Vici Gaming versus Secret tomorrow in the loser bracket final.
Day 4 schedule:
18:30-21:00: VG vs LGD
21:00-23:30: Secret vs EG
00:00-02:30: LGD vs EG
02:30-05:00: VG vs Secret
Game 1
Evil Geniuses had the upperhand in this game from the get-go when they got all their cores farming well during the laning phase while LGD's Beastmaster and Razor was struggling to get creep kills. EG tried to go for the quick push at 8 minutes game time but it was easily stopped by LGD's Leshrac rotating in to help.
Instead, LGD tried to push the bottom lane but with no Diabolic Edict leveled on the Leshrac, they took a long time to do it, long enough for EG to converge on them and surround them for a team wipe. If that wasn't enough to secure EG's firm lead, EG team wiped LGD against just two minutes later as they attempted for the tier one tower.
Despite all that advantage, EG still had a difficulty pushing onto high ground and had to resort to split pushing out of respect for LGD's superior team fight skills. To do that, EG picked up the Aegis and split their team into three groups, Puck on the top lane, Bristleback, Io and Abaddon on the middle lane and Nature's Prophet on the bottom lane. It took them three minutes but they were finally able to take down the bottom melee barracks.
EG's second push to end the game was calculated perfectly and they were able to throw their own heroes in order to take down the remaining LGD barracks. LGD tapped out shortly after.
Game 2
"Disaster" is the only word we could use for LGD's laning phase. After giving off the First Blood to Juggernaut, LGD's Puck responded slowly to Tiny's engagement on EG's Magnus leading to a 3-man Reverse Polarity which ended in the death of the Tiny and Puck on the middle lane. LGD continued getting pick off all over the map and had a significant increase in gold deficit going into the middle game.
Firmly leading on the net worth leaderboard, EG attempted to kill Roshan at 15 minutes but LGD's Rosh defense was surprisingly good and picked off four. Fortunately for EG, LGD could hardly do any damage to the dying Roshan, allowing them to respawn and return for round two. The second fight, led by Universe's Sand King got three of LGD killed (Tiny and Io killed by Roshan's stomp) and Juggernaut quickly finished Roshan before the bought back Tiny and Io rejoined the fight.
LGD did put up a valiant effort trying to make a comeback as they successfully won several engagements all over the map but it was not until the second Roshan respawn that EG really solidified their lead. Led once again by the Sand King's Epicenter and Stun, EG's Juggernaut only needed one hit on the Earthshaker, Io and Puck to kill all three.
Despite securing the Aegis and Cheese, EG was still hesitant to put towards the high ground fearing that LGD, known for their superior high ground defense, could stage a comeback off a battle or two. Therefore, they farmed LGD's jungle and starved them until they held a significant lead going into Roshan number three.
LGD was prepared to contest for the third Roshan but Juggernaut intentionally not hit the Roshan during its final seconds to ensure that the Aegis would not be stolen. However, the Aegis was still stolen by Puck but EG's heroes were way too farmed to even care as they overran the rest of LGD's backlines.
EG quickly transitioned the fight into a push on the bottom lane and secured their win.
Headline image from BTS flickr.
