LCK 10th Anniversary

League of Legends Champions Korea (LCK) is celebrating its 10th year anniversary, as well as the opening of the Spring 2022 Season. LCK has seen many talents and famous names emerge, and they wanted to celebrate it. LCK also awarded exceptional players in the 2021 LCK Awards. Aside from this, a special grandiose opening reminiscing our favorite LCK moments were made to celebrate the occasion.  Read on to see the results of DRX vs LSB and T1 vs KDF.

All games this season will be held in LoL Park in Seoul, with a live audience.

LCK Spring 2022: DRX vs LSB

The season was inaugurated by a series from DRX against Liiv SANDBOX. One thing of note is LSB Kim “Dove” Jae-yeon, previously a mid laner, has now role swapped to top lane. This is to make space for Lee “Clozer” Ju-hyeon, who was Lee “Faker” Sang-hyeok's understudy back in T1. 2020 World Champion Support Cho “BeryL” Geon-hee now plays for DRX, playing alongside Kim “Deft” Hyuk-kyu.

This series proved to be a quick one. LSB swiftly defeated DRX in a 2-0 fashion, shocking viewers and fans alike. Considering the players on both teams, nobody could've predicted this outcome.

Game 1

The first game in the series saw LCK's first Sona support in 1647. Sona was locked in by BeryL, supplementing Deft's Aphelios pick.

 

 

On the Liiv SANDBOX side, Dove made his top lane debut with Tryndamere. Aided by Kim “Kael” Jin-hong's Yuumi, Dove quickly took over the game. Deft, however, showed us a glimpse of “200 Years” with his Aphelios plays, attempting to march DRX to victory. He was almost successful, if not for an Ace by LSB catalyzed by a great Scatter The Weak from Clozer.

This ended up being DRX's curtain call for game 1 as LSB push for victory. LSB claim LCK Spring 2022's first victory screen.

Game 2

For game 2, Clozer abandoned the mage role from game 1 and instead picks an aggresive champion: Akali. Dove locks in Tryndamere once again, perhaps hoping to take over the game like he did previously. Game 2 was a “mechanical show off,” with great micro decisions made from both sides. BeryL especially hit great hooks on his Thresh in the early game. These hooks, unfortunately, were not enough to wrestle bot side control from LSB. LSB jungler Kim “Croco” Dong-beom had enough space to grab a few dragons quickly.

With an exceptional performance from both Dove and Croco, LSB continually encroached DRX's space, and eventually took the Nexus.

A surprising 2-0 series win for Liiv SANDBOX.

LCK Spring 2022: T1 vs KDF

If you're a League of Legends fan, you're probably a Faker fan. By extension, at some point you would've followed his team, T1. This series between T1 and Kwangdong Freecs features many familiar names for T1 fans. 3 out of the 5 players KDF has were at one point, T1 players. Jungler Choi “Ellim” El-lim, bot laner Park “Teddy” Jin-seong, and support Ryu “Hoit” Ho-seong all played under T1's banner last year.

Aside from ex-teammates going against each other, T1's top lane rookie Choi “Zeus” Woo-je goes against the Rookie Killer and one of the best LCK top laners, Kim “Kiin” Gi-in. Unfortunately we didn't get to see a lot of this matchup. Due to the nature of the games, top lane was again left on an island. Rookie Zeus did not get enough time to shine today, but hopefully we see his growth over the season.

Overall, the series was very “LCK-like.” Slow games where both teams just wait for each other to make mistakes, or are afraid to make one themselves.

This series, once again, was a clean sweep from T1. T1 bot laner Lee “Gumayusi” Min-hyeong and support Ryu “Keria” Min-seok were sure to shut down some non-believers with their performance. Teddy also experienced some real-life struggles with his face mask and glasses. Check it out:

 

Game 1

The series opener was quite interesting to watch, especially the bot lane. With the matchup not exactly countering each other, winning lane relied on skill. KDF bot duo Teddy and Hoit gain the upper hand early with a 2v2 kill on T1 support Keria. However, T1 jungler Moon “Oner” Hyeon-joon repeatedly lent a helping hand to his bot lane, keeping KDF from snowballing the lead.

The junglers Oner and Ellim were the cornerstone of this very slow game. Everything rested on their hands, and Oner did better over his counterpart. The stalemate was broken with a huge mid lane fight, where T1 emerge victorious. This meant T1 can move up to KDF's space and deny them their resources. T1 got too strong to the point that KDF's team composition can neither walk in nor contest anything. The game goes back to its slow state, as both teams wait for each other to make a mistake.

T1 decide to wake up and slay Baron Nashor. What followed was a team fight started off by a huge Trueshot Barrage from Gumayusi's Ezreal, but somehow KDF wins the fight.

At this point, the gold lead was basically nil. T1 can no longer push with their Baron buff, and it is instead used to make space for the Elder Dragon take. After a long dance in front of the Elder Dragon, T1 claim the game-ending buff. They place the final nail in the KDF coffin, and claim their Nexus. While most people did expect T1 to win this game, it was unexpected of them to let the game come to a point where KDF almost came back.

 

Game 2

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For game 2, T1 drafted a challenging comp. The Nidalee for Oner had no synergy with the ranged champions T1 picked, with the exception of Jax in the top lane. Oner, of course, proves his skill with an early double kill on KDF's bot duo after a successful dive. Gumayusi and Keria wanted more, and earn two more kills in the bot lane shortly after. At this point, bot lane was “donezo” for KDF according to the commentators. Oner's Nidalee was proving useful all over the map, but his counterpart in Ellim had almost no bot or mid presence.

The fact that T1 had a challenging composition is an unshakable fact. Despite this, they stomp KDF anyway. The difficulty of the comp became irrelevant as T1's squad were just the better players. KDF, however, earned themselves a glimmer of hope. Yoo “FATE” Su-hyeok orchestrates a fight for KDF with Syndra's Scatter The Weak. This gets KDF 3 kills across the map. While great, it was not enough to put them back in the game.

At this point, KDF was afraid to make mistakes. Their inaction results in another slow mid game. It wears off when T1 decided to slay the Rift Herald, where KDF attempted to contest. Due to superior team fighting from T1, they get 4 kills and the Eye of the Herald. The Eye was used to break KDF's mid tier 1 tower, and KDF could no longer close the gap. Walking up was not an option for them, as the T1 composition possess longer range and were significantly ahead in gold.

LCK's inaugural day for Spring Season 2022 almost had a pentakill from Faker, if not for Oner denying it:

After this “Faker-like ending,” T1 decide to conclude the game. The series ended as a 2-0 stomp from T1.

LCK Spring 2022: Want more?

Want more LCK? Here's our list of games to watch for this week, including the match of the week from 2020 World Champions Damwon KIA against Gen.G. The schedule for LCK games is also available here.

All LCK games are streamed on lolesports.com, the official Twitch channel, and occasionally on the official LCK Global YouTube channel.