Hello everyone and welcome to the top 8 edition of Storm Watch! With the first round of playoffs taken care of we had very few “upsets”. TFF was the only team that won over a seed lower than them. With Replays having expired I cannot watch the games over but will try my best to talk about each series that happened. As far as pickems go the staff has read the script and no one else has it appears. Out of the 18 pickems submitted only 2 correctly predicted the first round Myself and Crewman44 both of us being staff in BOL.
Top 16 Recap
Left Side
The Shattered Spire(seed 1 Seed Demacia) Vs. Final Boss Alpha(seed 4 Seed Noxus)
My Predictions: 3-0 The Shattered Spire
Result: 3-1 The Shattered Spire
MVP of Winning Side: Witchatblakmass Jungler of The Shattered Spire
Mvp of Losing Side: Doctor Shrouds Mid Laner of Final Boss Alpha
The Shattered Spire started this series with a dominant win in game 1, lost game 2 and had 2 close games for their 1st playoff round. I think this should worry TSS as Alpha was statistically the worst team to make the playoffs and Alpha not only won game 2 but did so convincingly being up 6 towers and ahead almost 8k gold in a 35-minute game. I was expecting this series to be a lot more dominant for TSS after game 1 they kind of dropped the ball they were down in Dragons and Rift Hearlds taken across the rest of the series and let Alpha take more towers than they did all season. Neither of these teams pulled off anything crazy in the drafts but Doctor Shrouds was forced to dig deep into their champion pool as he was the one targeted on the Side of Final Boss. TSS were throwing their bans at the right player as Doctor Shrouds had an incredible series. Doctor Shrouds had the best individual performance of any player in their Asol win in game 2, made the most money of everyone on his team all series long and had 2 incredible games keeping the series close. As far as the MVP for TSS it was Witchatblakmass in the jungle. Witchatblakmass had a 4.87 KDA this series and had the largest gold gap despite playing mostly toward tank junglers.
Ely On Ice(seed 2 Freljord) Vs. Monkey Fever(seed 3 Ionia)
My Predictions: 3-2 ELY On Ice
Result: 3-1 Monkey Fever
MVP of Winning Side: Evil Zara Mid Laner of Monkey Fever
Mvp of Losing Side: Dilly ADC of ELY on Ice
I was completely wrong in my prediction on this series as Monkey Fever smashed Elysium on Ice. In ICE's 3 losses they got just 4 towers and 2 dragons Monkey Fever were way better than them winning every game in under 30 minutes with massive gold leads and kill leads. To be fair to ICE they also destroyed Fever in game 3 where ICE won in under 30 minutes with a 15k gold lead but when the kills overall in this series were 54 for Fever to 35 for ICE(Ice had 22 of their kills in their win) it shows you just how dominant Fever was. As far as MVPs go Evilzara in the mid-lane for Fever easily gets the vote they died just once in their 3 wins ending the series with a 12.6 KDA, made the most gold of any player in this series and farmed the most CS of any player. For the MVP of the losing team it's hard to pick someone. CZI had the lowest kill participation of anyone on ICE in this series but was the MVP in their win while split-pushing as Trundle. Dilly is probably the MVP for ICE they were the only player on ICE to get anywhere close to the gold their lane opponent got and were constantly dealing respectable damage.
Monkeys Reformed(seed 1 Ionia) Vs. Kittens With Mittens(seed 4 Demacia)
My Predictions: 3-0 Monkeys Reformed
Result: 3-0 Monkey Reformed
MVP of Winning Side: MustForgiveMe ADC of Monkeys Reformed
Mvp of Losing Side: Slayer Jinx Jungler of Kittens With Mittens
With a 3-0 win Reformed won this series as we all expected. These series however were not the complete stomps I expected in games 1 and 2 where KWM were able to keep even in gold and kills. But as the series progressed Reformed started to play better and better. In game 1 KWM was ahead all game and lost with a gold and kill lead, in game 2 Refomed was ahead slightly but KWM dragged the game out to 35 minutes. Game 3 was the expected stomp I had coming into this series. For KWM both Chosen in mid lane and Slayer Jinx at Jungle are my MVP candidates. While Soez carried game 1 for KWM they did not play lights out the rest of the series and Finality was basically useless in game 1. While Chosen had the better KDA across the series I am giving the MVP to Slayer Jinx doing 700 damage a minute as a jungler is crazy good especially on Skarner and Lilia when your team has no one else on the frontline. MustForgiveMe at ADC of Monkeys Reformed I guess gets the MVP for the winning team? MustForgiveMe is the reason that this team won game 1 on Jihn not dying once during the 38-minute slug fest of a game. MustForgiveMe also played well in game 3 as Ziggs getting to toss bombs at a really low-range team and doing plenty of tower damage and doing the most damage in this series overall.
Syndicate Crashouts(seed 2 Noxus) Vs. TTM Aegeon(seed 3 Freljord)
My Predictions: 3-1 Syndicate Crashouts
Result: 3-1 Syndicate Crashouts
MVP of Winning Side: Stuckk Darro Top laner of Syndicate
Mvp of Losing Side: FallN Jungler of TTM Aegeon
Syndicate won this series off of their laning prowess and side laning like I talked about. Taunty2k in the top lane played tanks every game while Stuckk Darro was free to play split push giving them tower advantages in every game. If it was not for these advantages in the top lane I think the crashouts would have lost so Stuckk Darro gets the MVP. Zuiy was denied away from his signature carry champions and had just 1 good game this series on Talyiah, IceIceBabyLOL was stuck on tank duty getting jungle diffed and Spuds was well Spuds. WellShowThemAll did a lot of heavy lifting when given hyper-carries but was ineffective when playing more tempo-orientated marksmen.
So what do I mean that Zuiy was denied his picks did TTM just 5 ban him all the time? Well Yeah TTM drafted smartly they took away the more blind picable mids that Zuiy plays as Zuiy never picked in the first rotation. TTM drafted towards their 2v2 and picked tons of CC every game making it nearly impossible to pick something like Akshan. With Stuckk Darro split pushing the team needed engaged so IceIceBabyLOL was put onto tank duty further dissauding Zuiy from playing aggressively early. IceIceBabyLOL was down in gold almost 4.5k a game on average and did the least damage this series out of the non-supports. Games would have TTM grouping together as a deathball winning early while XG bilt huge gold leads from their side lane pressure. Eventually when the teamfights actually mattered Syndicate won fights without fail as TTM would flub key skill shots and not respect CC.
Right Side
Tilt Esports(seed 1 Freljord) Vs. Optimal Esports Enigma(seed 4 Ionia)
My Predictions: N/A
Result: 3-1 Tilt Esports
Again as the top laner I Do not enjoy writing much about my own team so again this section will be brief. Game 1 of this series had OEE simply play better than Tilt early on and built a huge gold advantage. OEE got multiple solo kills and by the time team fights rolled around OEE was simply able to win fights thanks to their gold lead doing more damage and being able to escape combat rather than dying. In game 2 RatQueenDeleliah carried fights as Lilia. 4 different 3+ sleeps plus a huge farm lead let Tilt take it. In games 3+4 we had to esub in KTL. With KTL Tilt shifted their focus to bot lane and camped Civil to make him as much of a non factor as possible. In game 4 Tilt employed the rat strat and split pushed to victory. Ctrl Ult Elite played side lanes the whole game as Mundo and took towers. Whenever someone extra grouped to stop him Tilt engaged and won fights.
AK Hearts(seed 2 Demacia) Vs. TFF Aftershock(seed 3 Demacia)
My Predictions: 3-2 TFF
Result: 3-2 TFF
MVP of Winning Side: Rutledge
Mvp of Losing Side: Okami
TFF pulled off a reverse sweep in this series have a huge comeback against AK Hearts. AK hearts drafted really interestingly in games the first 3 games. AKH took mages in the bot lane for Florgato and flexing ADCs to the mid lane for Okami while playing more split push style top laners like Gnar and Yorick. This gave AKH immense wave clear and disengage potential allowing them to slowly build gold leads and get to objectives first. But as the series continued Sychoghost started to be banned out of their strong top laners and was unable to carry. Game 3 was the least close game of the series as Keorra also started to have actual playable lanes as well and popped off as an ADC. The game 3 draft from AKH had almost no damage in it and very little targeted CC for Zeri so Keorra crushed this game. Rutledge of course did fantastic all series long for TFF as well. With 3 mid lane bans in game 4 AKH had a less than stellar mid matchup and TFF was able to control XSoccer25X. Game 5 TFF crushed AKH. AKH trolled their draft taking blue side and having 3 losing lanes and a jungler that needs to be ahead to be effective in Diana.
XG Rataoskr(seed 1 Noxus) Vs. Mint Gaming Mafia(Seed 4 Freljord)
My Predictions: 3-1 XG
Result: 3-0 XG
MVP of Winning Side: Mei and McFeeds the bot lane of XG
Mvp of Losing Side: Him ADC of Mint Gaming
Well it is fair to say that Mint were not him despite having him on their roster. Getting just 2 towers in this series and 2 dragons while losing every game in 25 minutes and being down over 12 thousand gold is not a good look. XG dominated especially in the bot lane where Mei and McFeeds died no more than once a game this entire series. Him was the only player on this team to end a game with a positive KDA in one game as Jihn despite Mollywhops inting him as Karma so he gets the MVP I guess. Boxing Buddah, KappaOne, and Mollywhops all finished the series with below a 1.0 KDA and INguyen had the biggest gold gaps of any player in this series. I am starting to feel that the teams in first might have well gotten a bye at this point.
Conduit Gremlins(seed 2 Ionia) Vs. The Spire Cats(Seed 3 Noxus)
My Predictions: 3-1 Conduit Gremlins
Result: 3-0 Conduit Gremlins
MVP of Winning Side: LordiSama Top Laner of Conduit Gremlins
Mvp of Losing Side: WaterCat Mid laner of The Spire Cats
The Gremlins clean swept through the Spire Cats playing through their top side of the map. NotSoDark played the weakside special of Ashe, Serraphine and Jihn more or less getting carried and ensuring that POOPSOCKSBOSSMAN could never get a substantial lead. Storm in the top lane for The Spire Cats got top gapped by LordiSama despite having counter pick in all 3 games. WaterCat in the mid lane was the MVP of the Spire Cats even without a great KDA. Farming 10 cs a minute(9.6 to be technical) and doing almost 1000 damage a minute on average over 3 games is a herculean effort. Honestly other then WaterCat the rest of the Cats did not show up. TSC never took an inhibitor turret this series and barley killed and neutrals Conduit was just all over them.
Predictions
The Shattered Spire(seed 1 Seed Demacia) Vs. Monkeys Fever(seed 3 Seed Ionia)
My Prediction: 3-1 Monkey Fever
Lane To Watch: Jungle
Despite being the higher seed heading into this matchup I have little faith in The Shattered Spire. I still do not believe that TSS has played a great team yet this BOL Emerald season. They have played against a few good teams like AK Hearts(who they almost lost to despite AKH having just 1 ban the entire series) and The Spire Cats but no team that I would have predicted to make the top 8. Monkey Fever on the other hand is a team that has played some great teams like Reformed and Conduit and looked competitive. Fever has taken games off of these teams and Fever should be a top 4 team.
While both teams finished last week 3-1 in their series I would argue that Fever played better than I anticipated and TSS played worse than I thought they would. TSS had a longer game time average, lost more towers and won with smaller gold leads against arguably the weakest team in playoffs last week. Fever won their games 6 minutes faster on average last week, had just 34 deaths compared to the 93 of TSS, and made 200 more gold a minute as a team. In the regular season, TSS had the best stats in the league as they only dropped 1 game but Fever was the team in second in most of the categories that these two teams were elite at. Fever was the only other team taking 3 dragons a game on average and the only other team getting over 1000 CS a game.
As far as the lane to watch and where I would be focusing on is the jungle. Both Saleor of Fever and Witchatblakmass have been key carries for both these teams all year. Both have a wide variety of champions that they can draft and play from the more normal tank junglers of Sejuani and Skarner to the carries of Gwen and Olaf with random bruisers like Xin Zhao and Vi to keep things interesting. When we look at the stats comparing the two Saleor does come out ahead as you would expect of the 4th best player in the league. Saelor has better stats across the board having a higher kill participation, more gold a game, more damage a minute and all while doing more damage to objectives as well.
Monkeys Reformed(seed 1 Seed Ionia) Vs. Syndicate Crashouts(seed 2 Seed Noxus)
My Prediction: Monkey Reformed 3-2
Lane To Watch:
One of probably the more hyped matches of the year for me I predicted that both of these teams would be ending this season in the top 4. Monkeys Reformed looked great last week despite a shacky game one and still appears to be the team to beat right now. Syndicate are probably the most volatile team left in our bracket Syndicate can beat anyone on a good day like when they 2-0d TFF. The Crashouts also tend to live up to their name as well this team lost a game to Maelstrom. (╯‵□′)╯︵┻━┻ Apperntly Syndicate got mad and kicked who they felt were underperforming players after that series but anger and frustration is just an everyday occurrence for the Crashouts.
When we look at last week's games both teams had struggles and prevailed. Syndicate leaned on their ability to teamfight trusting their solo lanes to build up advantages and relying on their macro. Reformed in their last series refined their game making sure that they were playing compositions that could close out a series and win fights with huge numbers. When we look at the stats from across the regular season both teams had almost identical stats. The Crashout had a slightly higher KDA at 4.27 compared to Refomreds 4.08. The Crashouts had the fattest average game time of any team but Reformed had the fastest game time in their group. Both teams were tied in Dragons taken a game and towers taken but Crashouts overall killed more Barons. Reformed made more gold a minute and farmed more CS than Syndicate but the numbers are basically tied. Overall these two teams look close both are dominant in certain aspects of league and have the potential to have a long series.
I think that mid lane should have the most impact in this series. Zuiy has been the best player on the Crashouts being one of the league leaders in DPM, gold a minute and is on average up over 3000 gold on his laner while playing champions that demand respect with tons of outplay potential and roaming captablities. EvilZara I doubt is going to play tanks or CC machines like EAST Pity we are more likely to see the Tristana or Lucian counter picks and some all in fights.
Tilt Esports(seed 1 Seed Freljord) Vs. TFF Aftershock(seed 3 Seed Noxus)
My Prediction: N/A
Lane To Watch: Mid Lane
As the top laner of Tilt Esports I do not enjoy writing about the teams I play on as it feels pretentious. Obviously, I feel that Tilt should win tonight as I am biased toward my team. As far as the lane to watch we all know it's the mid-lane matchup of Rutledge for TFF Vs. Albino Sun Bear of Tilt. Both play almost completely the opposite of one another where Rutledge plays to be the major carry and damage threat Albino Sun Bear is more of a facilitator trying to make sure that he gets his teammates ahead. It will be interesting to see whos playstyle prevails. Will Rutledge take the leads he is given and just decide teamfights with his burst onto key targets? Or will Sun Bear helping the rest of Tilt make it a 1v9 for the side of TFF?
XG Ratasokr(seed 1 Seed Noxus) Vs. Conduit Gremlins(seed 2 Seed Ionia)
My Prediction: 3-1 Conduit Gremlins
Lane To Watch: Top Lane
I have shown that I am an XG hater all season so I have Conduit winning this streamed series tonight. I have no hate towards any of these individual players(and even like some of them Hi Mei!) but I just do not like this team overall. Conduit has been the dark horse this year putting up numbers in their wins with some new faces to competitive and honestly they were the team I least wanted to play on the entire right side of the bracket. Last week both teams showed why they are in the playoffs. XG speed ran their series winning ever series with huge gold leads and nearly perfect games not letting Mint take almost any objectives at all. Conduit continued to show that they have probably the best top side of any team in BOLE. Lordi Sama, Pinei nessa poha and YoloswagftwR just took over and never gave the Spire cats time to try and scale into the game.
As far as comparing stats both teams simply crushed the team they played last week. The same is true of the regular season as well XG played probably weaker opponents and won with better numbers. XG had a faster game time average, more kills, less deaths and less objectives taken against them not just last week but all season long. XG ended the season with the second highest KDA of any team whereas the Gremlins have the lowest KDA of any team in the top 8, XG killed more dragons this season, 1.5 more towers a game and farmed more CS. So why do I still favour Conduit? I still feel that XG to me is unproven they played 1 team in actual playoff ready form TFF and they lost that series. Conduit has some of the highest individual performances from any player this season whereas XG has dominated together as a team. I believe that in this streamed series tonight Conduit is going to win games based on their hands and ability to outplay. Conduit has the killer instinct and I don't think XG does.
Top lane is the lane to watch this series. LordiSama has been dominant pushing in restlessly taking plates and leading the league in Solo kills. Spoobert has shown their versatility on XG playing more games as the weakside playing Gragas and Ornn just as much as Renekton and Aatrox. If Spoobert can play this weak side style and keep relevant the rest of XG should be able to take over but LordiSama has shown all year that if you give them an inch they will take a mile snowballing on side laners like Tryndamere and Fiora.
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