A rundown of all the action from the first official week of competition in the EU LCS.
One week down and there is already buzz from all the games that were played. Vaunted teams underperforming, discarded rosters exceeding all expectations. And there was even a professional game that featured a Taric. Truly outrageous, right? Well, in case you missed it, here's a quick synopsis of everything that happened and how it affects the landscape moving forward.
Titans falling
You have to start with the largest talking point of "everyone's pick as the new #1 team in Europe" Origen going 0-2 the first week. Many pundits linked their serious underperformance with the team's lack of preparation, as it was reported that Origen suffered through Internet issues at their gaming house and were not able to practice nearly as much as they would have liked.
However, not only was Origen mechanically outplayed by their opponents, but their picks and bans in both games showed a tremendous lack of understanding of the current meta. Picking late-game champions like Ryze and Kassadin in a meta that stresses pushing early leads and overall shorter game times is an insane risk to take, especially when deciding to pick both against a quality team like h2k Gaming. We shall have to see whether Origen is able to bounce back and actually perform to the level we expect of them or if the team's problems run deeper than just an off week of practice.
The redemption of the defeated
While Origen dropped off hard from their Worlds performance, some teams that were written off this season came in and took everyone by surprise. The now 2-0 Unicorns of Love were seen by many to be maybe a middle-of-the-pack team when losing their star Mid Laner Tristan "PowerOfEvil" Schrage to Origen in the offseason. UOL filled many of their roster holes with veteran players who played in the LCS but never proved themselves to be feared carries. But it is always dangerous to underestimate, especially when you have players like Daniel "Diamondprox" Reshetnikov and Hampus "Fox" Myhre who really carried the team on the back of their performances on Elise and Zed repsectively.
Similar teams like Elements and ROCCAT who were predicted to hug the bottom of the standings also came out of Week 1 with a win. ROCCAT in particular showed they were not afraid of anyone or to pull out bizzare picks like a Taric or a Top Lane Zac when needed.
Young blood
With the exodus of veteran talent and teams that EU saw during the offseason, many wondered how the new teams and rookies coming in would perform. And, with the exception of Splyce, it can be safe to say it actually went pretty good. Team Vitality, who many saw as another potential superteam in EU, had mixed results, dropping a game to ROCCAT but showed resiliency and managed to bounce back against Fnatic. Another rookie organization who showed some resiliency was G2 Esports, who managed to come back from a significant deficit in their second game of the week against ROCCAT to go 2-0 in their first ever week of LCS play.
Conclusion
As many have liked to point out, this is only the first week. Origen's hopes for dominance and a better performance than last year are not completely dashed (yet). And G2 Esports is not necessarily going to wind up a top 3 team by the end of the season. However, every story has a beginning and the start of the EU LCS has definitely turned many heads and leaves the rest of the split looking much cloudier moving forward.
