LCS Week 8: Five Games to Watch

We’re getting even closer to the League of Legends Championship Series (LCS) Playoffs with a few teams still in contention for the top six.

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Some teams have shot up the standings while others are barely holding on to their Playoffs spot. With Worlds on the horizon, there’s everything to play for so every team will be hoping to build up some momentum when it matters most.

Golden Guardians (1.86) vs 100 Thieves (1.87)

Last week didn’t quite go to plan for 100 Thieves as they lost against Cloud9 though that was mostly down to some amazing individual performances from their opponents. However, 100T still looks miles better than they did at the start of the split and are a serious threat to the rest of the league’s Playoff contenders.

Meanwhile, Golden Guardians have dropped off heavily from their early-split form. The team looked like top-two contenders thanks to veteran mid-laner Henrik “Froggen” Hansen but the team’s bot-lane was a clear weakness. Since the team’s struggles, GG decided to bring in a new bot-lane and Australian ADC Ian "FBI" Huang has been especially impressive.

However, he might struggle against two-time World Champion Bae "Bang" Jun-sik so 100 Thieves probably have the edge.

Counter Logic Gaming (1.32) vs Echo Fox (3.15)

Likely the most one-sided match-up this week, CLG look like one of the strongest teams in NA while Echo Fox are almost undoubtedly the worst.

There does seem to be a lot of internal issues over at Echo Fox as the organisation have proposed to sell their LCS spot while star top-laner Colin “Solo” Earnest lived up to his name as the organisation benched him following his remarks of the team’s performances on social media. New jungler Mike Yeung has also been heavily disappointing with a total KDA of 5/28/10 since joining.

Meanwhile, CLG cleanly disposed of Cloud9 to move into a tied position for second place with said team. CLG’s macro play is perhaps only matched by league-leaders Team Liquid in NA so this match should be a breeze. However, as an organisation CLG does have a history of faltering or wasting opportunities, just something to keep in mind especially if you’re looking for a big-money upset.

Golden Guardians (2.04) vs OpTic Gaming (1.71)

This really is a crucial week for Golden Guardians’ playoff hopes as OpTic Gaming will be an equally as tough challenge.
OpTic picked up a fantastic win against Team SoloMid last week thanks to Lee "Crown" Min-ho who stayed ahead of Soren “Bjergsen” Bjerg, making it easy for William “Meteos” Hartman. The team’s top-laner Niship "Dhokla" Doshi was equally impressive in both games last week, if he can perform like that again then OpTic will shoot up the standings.

Team SoloMid (1.41) vs 100 Thieves (2.70)

TSM are the favourites for this match but considering their current form, you might want to look at the match closely.

TSM were completely outclassed by OpTic and were only able to win against Golden Guardians because their opponents gifted them a 50/50 Baron opportunity. The storied organisation has so much talent but once again the team just aren’t proactive enough, this roster doesn’t look like the same one that took Team Liquid to five games in the Spring Split finals.

100 Thieves are still fighting valiantly to secure a spot in the Playoffs and have all the quality to win this bout even if their opponents do improve. This could be an extremely close match but at the very least, it’ll be entertaining.

Team Liquid (1.45) vs Cloud9 (2.60)

Finally, we have a blockbuster match between two of the best teams in the LCS. Team Liquid are still top of the standings and easily look like the best the region has to offer but we’ve seen that Cloud9 can hurt them.

It was actually Cloud9 who came out on top the last time these two teams met and the joint-second team will be looking to complete an impressive double. However, C9 have been inconsistent in recent times and were completely outplayed by CLG.

The team did manage to secure a big win over 100 Thieves but that was mostly because of Yasin “Nisqy” Dincer’s monstrous performance. It will take a few special performances from C9 to pick up the upset win but despite their quality, it’s difficult to see that happening.

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Pictures: Riot / LoL Esports Photos / Flickr