esports
SKT will meet China's Royal Club in the League of Legends World Finals.
A five hour semifinal series between SK Telecom T1 and NaJin Black Sword came down to a one minute exchange and a split-second decision.
With everything on the line for both teams, SKT pushed up the middle lane to try and knock down an inhibitor and make their growing gold lead into an insurmountable advantage. But they got more than they bargained for as Gu “Expression” Bon Taek’s Shen used Stand United on Kim “Nagne” Sang Moon’s Ahri and arrived to trigger a full-scale teamfight. But even before NaJin Sword could get their engagement, SKT’s mid laner Lee “Faker” Sang Hyeok capped off a career night by reading the play and pre-empting it with a devastating Command: Shockwave from his Orianna that demolished the close-packed Sword team.
Instantly, NaJin Sword were thrown onto the defensive as they tried to run for the safety of their base, but SKT were determined to close out a series that had already proven too dangerous and volatile for their liking. They gave chase, ripping down the Sword squad while eating tower hits right and left, grabbing a game-winning ace and 27 a 27 minute nexus to secure their slot in the final next Friday to face off against Royal Club, who beat Fnatic on Saturday.
It was a fast and explosive ending to a series with myriad twists and turns as the two Korean titans traded blows and games. From the first, SKT were caught off guard by Nagne’s superb presence in mid-lane and terrifying dominance with Gragas, as he shut down Faker’s Ahri hard in the first game and exacted an ever increasing toll in fights.
But NaJin Sword got greedy following their game 1 victory, basically running the exact same composition in Game 2 and thereby letting SKT gameplan them into a decisive defeat in which SKT picked up 10 towers against a single turret kill from NaJin sword.
Picks and bans were not so kind to SKT in the third game, however, as jungler Bae “bengi” Seong Ung tried to run a jungle Aatrox and NaJin Sword once again got Gragas for Nagne. This time, SKT’s normally reliable carry and support combo of Chae “Piglet” Gwang Jin and Lee “PoohManDu” Jeong Hyeon started falling apart, with ManDu repeatedly caught out of position at crucial moments. Bengi’s Aatrox was unable to help stabilize any of the lanes, and NaJin’s top laner Gu “Expression” Bon Taek’s poweful Renekton started to run away with the game. Stymied by uneven execution and a weak comp, SKT were cornered and eventually overpowered before the forty minute mark.
That disaster marked a decisive shift for SKT, however. They stopped letting Nagne have Gragas, banning him for the rest of the series, denied Expression his Renekton, and got better performances from both Piglet and PoohManDu. Game 4 was a crushing victory for SKT as Faker broke the game wide open and Piglet ran riot in bottom. By 18 minutes, SKT had a 14 thousand gold lead, and NaJin surrendered only a few minutes later.
NaJin never regained control of the series, once again letting SK Telecom win the picks phase with a Jax, Lee Sin, and Orianna that would quickly get out of control in the mid game. Nagne was a non-factor with Ahri and bottom laners Kim “PraY” Jong In and Jang “Cain” Nu weren’t able to manage Piglet and PoohManDu. While the game started slowly and cautiously, SKT were slightly outfarming and getting every dragon. Making matters worse, NaJin seemed to be losing every skirmish, meaning that by 25 minutes, SKT were up by 5k gold and NaJin were forced to try for a miracle teamfight in mid.
While NaJin had played a tremendous series, in the end they simply didn’t have enough weapons while SKT’s incredible depth and talent at every position meant that NaJin eventually ran out of strategies while being neutralized themselves. And with that, SK Telecom T1 will once again attempt to win Korea’s first League of Legends world championship, facing either Fnatic or Royal Club next Friday night at the Staples Center. Either team will have its work cut out trying to find a way to beat this incredible Korean squad.
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