LCK: Samsung Galaxy Defeats SK Telecom T1

SK Telecom T1 has been dominating the League of Legends competitions during the last couple of years. Most recently, they’ve become the champions at the Mid-Season Invitational that was played in Brazil. Clearly, it looks like SK Telecom could be starting another series of very good results.

Obviously, Samsung Galaxy League of Legends team thought otherwise. Two teams faced each other in the opening round of the LCK, and Galaxy claimed the win. Samsung Galaxy’s win against SKT is much more than just another result on the score board. It shows that SK Telecom T1 can be defeated which is an important reassurance for all League of Legends teams in the world.

It seemed that SKT was on their way to establishing such dominance that it threatened to make League of Legends competitions boring. Even during the MSI, G2 Esports indicated that SKT could be defeated. However, they were not strong enough at that point to defeat them. Samsung Galaxy managed to do what G2 could not.

Game One: Samsung Galaxy Dominating

Before the start of the match, Samsung Galaxy’s Lee ‘Crown’ Min-ho said in one interview that the team lacks confidence. This actually could have been seen in their previous matches. The Game One of the match between Samsung Galaxy and SKT started slowly. Even though we saw several smaller battles in the opening stages, nothing big happened until the ten-minute mark.

At that point, Samsung Galaxy managed to get the first kill of the game. Using confusion that ensued in SKT ranks, they managed to take over the Rift Herald. After that, Samsung Galaxy managed to establish even bigger control after they attacked SKT in the mid and in the bottom lane. Once again, Faker was not able to do much in this game, either.

With Samsung winning in both lanes, they managed to acquire a huge advantage in the game. This allowed them to move to the opponent’s jungle and that proved to be a crucial move of the first game. SKT had no idea what was going on until Crown and CoreJJ managed to get two kills that left Baron undefended. With Baron on their side, Samsung Galaxy rushed their way to the SKT’s base for the final blow. In that way, Samsung Galaxy won the first game of the series, and the confidence started to return to Samsung Galaxy’s players.

Game Two

SKT started Game Two very aggressively wanting to get a very early lead. However, that early pushed was very poorly executed which enabled Samsung to get the first two kills of the Game Two very early. In the next stage of the game, SKT was looking for some tactical solutions that might turn things around.

While SKT was looking for those tactical solutions, Samsung Galaxy was getting kills in the bottom lane where ever they turned. At that moment it became clear that SKT are in serious trouble. Their response came when Faker went on a four-man tout bringing Samsung Galaxy’s heroes in a very bad position. However, SKT players just had no idea how to find a kill in that position.

In that poorly executed fight, SKT lost Peanut, and without him as a jungler in the team, Samsung Galaxy took Baron once again without any problems. Instead of going directly towards the base, Samsung Galaxy, with Baron, decided to push through on all lanes which eventually led to the same result, and that was the end of that match.

The first round of the LCK started with a huge upset. If we are to judge the competition based on the opening matches, we are in for a fascinating tournament as rarely seen before. Samsung Galaxy has gained a lot of confidence with this win, and that will inevitably be reflected in their upcoming matches.