Week 2, Day 2 of the North American League of Legends Championship Series ended on Saturday with an absolute slugfest as Team EnVyUs took a 2-1 win over Team Liquid in Los Angeles.
Liquid's composition revolving around star AD carry Chae "Piglet" Gwang-jin's Xayah had a strong start when Liquid (0-3, 1-6 match record) picked up an Infernal Drake and first blood at 10 minutes. Piglet began to snowball, picking up a kill in a 2-vs-2 outplay and first tower gold, but EnVy stayed even in gold thanks to a large CS (creep score) lead for top laner Shin "Seraph" Woo-yeong's Jarvan IV. Try as Liquid might, it was unable to push its early kill lead, allowing EnVy's siege composition to lay waste to its towers. TL tried to retake control with a Baron attempt at 27 minutes, but atrocious team fighting led to EnVy (3-1, 7-4 match record) picking up the Baron instead. With the Baron buff in tow, EnVy rotated well in the late game and easily took Game 1 in 36 minutes.
Team Liquid kept its composure despite throwing Game 1, beginning Game 2 on a high note with mid laner Greyson "Goldenglue" Gilmer's Galio and jungler Kim "Reignover" Yeu-jin's Olaf linking up well to lead Liquid to an early lead. Goldenglue, the often maligned mid laner, shined on Galio, absorbing ridiculous amounts of damage and helping Reignover continuously blitz down EnVy's backline. Liquid's high powered team fighting composition quickly out-scaled that of EnVy's early-game focused pick/siege composition, holding an over 10,000-gold lead at 36 minutes. It might have taken a couple of Baron kills and an Elder Dragon, but Goldenglue led the way for TL with a flawless 5/0/12 KDA (kills/deaths/assists) as Liquid forced Game 3 with a 40-minute win.
In a series deciding Game 3, Goldenglue took Lucian into the mid lane, but it didn't matter much as EnVy was given almost all of its power picks. With mid laner Choi "Pirean" Jun-sik back on Taliyah and AD carry Apollo "Apollo" Price back on Caitlyn, EnVy's mid game siege potential was simply ridiculous. Liquid's team fighting composition did a decent job early on as EnVy was occasionally caught out, but EnVy took over the late game largely thanks to Apollo, who dealt a whopping 47,900 damage to enemy champions. It certainly took a while, but Apollo's 9/1/6 KDA led Team EnVyUs to a 42-minute win, securing the series win to go 2-0 on the weekend.