2022 LCS Championship Week 1: Liquid Sweep, Cloud9 Tough It Out
The League of Legends Championship Series (LCS) 2022 Championship has finally begun and eight of the top teams in the league have begun duking it out in order to not only win the illustrious title but claim one of three spots for this year's League of Legends World Championship.
This past week, four teams took it to the Summoner's Rift yielding varying results. Team Liquid made quick work of FlyQuest after losing an unexpected game one while Cloud9 managed to survive a valiant effort by Counter Logic Gaming that pushed the series to five games.
With that in mind, here's how the first round of the LCS 2022 Championship playoffs went.
Team Liquid Demolish FlyQuest After A Game One Surprise
Keeping key members of jungler Lucas "Santorin" Larsen and support Jo "CoreJJ" Yong-in as a base and adding mid-laner Soren "Bjergsen" Bjerg, top laner Gabriel "Bwipo" Rau, and AD Carry Steven "Hans Sama" Liv, Team Liquid was deadset to becoming the very best in North America once again.
At first, this year, they looked poised to live up to that, however, as the season progressed their initial ideals failed to bear fruit. Now after a solid defeat over FlyQuest, this star-studded roster is looking to put the "super" in super team.
In just four games, Liquid sent their first LCS 2022 Championship opponent, FlyQuest, to the lower bracket. But it wasn't without any surprises as their ever-so-green opponents made sure to strike first and strike hard.
This first game seemed to give Team Liquid a much-needed wake-up call as in the following two games they didn't skip a beat. Come game four, they were fully locked in. It was all-out aggression from the North American dynasty team: roaming, ganking, diving onto their enemies. The team's carries Bjergsen and Hans Sama were on point and there wasn't much FlyQuest could do.
With their win, Team Liquid will face off against 100 Thieves in Round 2 of the upper bracket.
Cloud9 Survive Counter Logic Gaming's Valiant Effort
There was no other team as looked at as this LCS 2022 Summer Split's Counter Logic Gaming. At first, like many times in the league's past, one of the LCS' oldest teams looked to just have a surprising split start just for them to fizzle out at the end. But it's been anything but, as after going through five losing seasons in which they finished bottom three in the league, they are once again contenders.
Going into this 2022 season the organisation decided to revamp the team from top to bottom, ushering in new and fresh talent. At first, during the spring, it didn't amount to much, but now, in the summer it's been firing on all cylinders.
With their sights set on the LCS 2022 Championship, this hungry and young team were looking to make their name even more known but first, they had to take out a Cloud9 team that have had their own struggles.
This year, Cloud9 went from the absolute pinnacle, dominating the LCS Spring Split regular season to just falling into an unexpected low in the playoffs. This made the team step back and rethink their ways - this meant changing up the roster. Up to this point, Cloud9 now with Nicolaj "Jensen" Jensen back in the mid lane, and Jesper "Zven" Svenningsen back in the bottom lane, this time as a support, hasn't looked as good. They were looking to change that.
The two highly motivated teams were going all out, which resulted in a back-and-forth five-game series.
Come the final game of the series, both Cloud9 and Counter Logic Gaming were up for the challenge, constantly skirmishing from minute one. Ultimately, Cloud9 took home the win thanks to AD Carry Kim "Berserker" Min-cheol's and top laner Ibrahim "Fudge" Allami's breakout performances.
With their victory, Cloud9 will have the tall task of taking down the reigning LCS champions, Evil Geniuses in Round 2 of the upper bracket.
