Team Whales versus Team BDS was the first series to go to all three games at Worlds 2023.
The VCS second seed, Team Whales completed its comeback against Team BDS after dropping the first match but clawed back to take the series at Worlds 2023. This has put Team Whales into the winner's match-up against CTBC Flying Oyster whilst Team BDS gets dropped to the elimination series against DetonatioN FocusMe.
BDS was the Worlds Qualifying Series Winner and showed just why they are one of the LEC's more underrated teams in the first match of the series against Whales. BDS had a near-perfect game against Whales as it was a very one-sided affair for the LEC squad. They kept Whales to just two kills in the first match, both of which were on Illias "nuc" Bizriken.
Adam "Adam" Maanane also went on a rampage with Darius in the top lane as he ended the match with eight kills, zero deaths, and four assists. It was a humiliating loss for Whales overall, which isn't the way they would have wanted to showcase their world championship debut. Luckily, it did not end in despair for the VCS as Whales managed to mount a comeback in games two and three.
And they showed just why with three changes to their team composition for the second match, only keeping Viego and Kai'Sa. And it was a clutch call to keep Kai'Sa as the champion of choice for Trần "Artemis" Quốc Hưng who had a perfect KDA of 11 kills, zero deaths, and eight assists. Trần "Bie" Đức Hiếu was the only other player to have zero deaths in the game as well with his Blitzcrank putting in work with a sole kill and 14 assists.
Whales were all over BDS in game two as the LEC fourth seed could not land key kills on their VCS counterpart when necessary. This was evident in one of the Whales' base pushes that saw four members retreat on slivers of health while managing to kite BDS, who failed to land the critical hits to kill them off. From then on, even the audience could tell that this series was going to go the distance.
And sadly, the third and final game was the nail in the coffin for BDS, who looked like they had burned through their reserves in the first two matches. BDS had gone for a totally different comp in game three in hopes of throwing a curve ball for the last match. Unfortunately for them, Whales stuck to their gameplan of denying BDS any momentum for over 40 minutes.
The VCS squad also managed to keep BDS' bloodluist to a minimum as they could only muster five kills in game three. For Whales, on the other hand, they secured 14 kills as Artemis once again had a clean game with five kills, zero deaths, and five assists. Nguyễn Võ "Sparda" Anh Hoàng on K'Sante was another standout performer with six kills, seven assists, and no deaths to boot.
It will now be a showdown of the ocean as CTBC Flying Oyster will face-off against Team Whales to determine who goes through to the second round of the Play-In Stage. Meanwhile, Team BDS will go up against DetonatioN FocusMe in a do-or-die series to keep someone's tournament hopes alive.
