Team EnVyUs and Team Liquid both came into their Week 3, Day 1 matchup looking for a win to keep out of the bottom of the North American League of Legends Championship Series standings. In surprisingly decisive fashion, NV walked all over Team Liquid and took a 2-0 sweep to stride out of the Los Angeles studios Friday with their first win of the season.
Team EnVyUs jumped out to a hot start in Game 1, killing Liquid top laner Samson "Lourlo" Jackson's Shen for first blood in a four-man dive around eight minutes. While Liquid would find scattered kills throughout the early-mid game, NV managed to stay even in kills while taking objectives, taking all of the early elemental drakes while securing a 9,000 gold lead at 31 minutes. Patient play and a big performance from mid laner Noh "Ninja" Geon-woo's Corki set NV up for a big win, taking a 3-for-1 teamfight win inside Liquid's base to secure Game 1 in just under 40 minutes.
The freefall was on in full force for Game 2 as Liquid struggled early despite some careless mistakes from NV. NV top laner Shin "Seraph" Wu-Yeong had a great time on Jayce despite getting caught out several times, bullying Lourlo's top lane Shen and demolishing towers to give his team an early gold lead. While Seraph sacrificed himself for map pressure, the rest of NV were able to take free objectives on the back of Ninja's Corki damage. Team Liquid failed to generate any momentum in any of their lanes, looking scattered and weak for a team that had playoff aspirations coming into the season. Batting aside Liquid's final defensive efforts, Ninja picked up a triple kill in Liquid's base at 33 minutes as Team EnVyUs won their first series of the split with a 2-0 sweep.