Hello everyone and welcome to the BOL Semi-Final preview. It is I CTRL ULT ELITE with the preview once again. So 1st off, sorry to XG Kartanah for spelling your name wrong in my article last week and to anyone else that I did that to. This week I am going to make sure to copy/paste every player's name to avoid this. We are now down to the top 4. Both Shurmia and Targon still have an even number of teams left in the tournament showing thaPointst neither group at the top level was that much more dominant over the other. Below you can find the updated bracket. I wish all of the teams left in the tournament a great set of games.
OER VS ELY Recap
3-1 For OER
MVP: Ravensman
For OER this series started rough but as the series progressed it became more and more OER favored. OER lost game 1 of this series. OER let OPKillswitch(the mid of ELY) have what I think is their best mid-laner in Ziggs in game 1 and they carried on it doing double the damage of JSChaoTiC(the mid of OER) on Azir. The rest of the series was rectified and they gave Ziggs the respect ban in round 1. Game 2 of that series was tense, taking 46 minutes and OER was able to claw their way back from a 5000 gold deficit at 20 minutes. Games 3 and 4 of this series were both blowouts OER had 46 kills to the 17 of ELY across the 2 games and ELY was unable to get a dragon and only secured 1 tower. As Far as individual performances go Ravensman of OER was of course their best player. I think that Louis0717 was probably the best player on this team not in the bot lane. They had a disaster of a game 1 but recovered in the rest of the series drawing attention and pressure on their split push of Mordekaiser.
XGL VS TEA Recap
3-0 For XGL
MVP: Prím
There is no real nice way to put this for TEA. XGL stomped them. Every game of this series was a blowout with XGL taking the game within 26 minutes. XGL dominated this series through and through TEA was only able to secure 2 neutral objectives across the 3 games and got 5 towers in 3 games. To put that in perspective XGL had dragon soul in 2 of these 3 games(had 11 neutrals in 3 games) and killed 8 towers a game(23 in 3 games). It is hard to pick an MVP for this series as everyone on XGL played incredibly well. Prím in the mid-lane for XGL would get my vote. They were up the most gold on average over their lane opponent every game. That is a big deal when you consider how much of the TEA game plan revolved around giving counter-picks to theélóÐËmÖñ and letting them carry the game alongside Yuupi. Prím made the most money on his team in ⅔ games and showed that even if your mid-lane picks are not traditional meta carries(Corki was picked in game 1 and stat wise he is the worst mid-laner in the game) you can still carry easily if you play well. Fenixflare for XGL also had a crazy good series huge shout-out to the game 2 kindred performance showing that OER cannot simply take the slow clearing junglers they prefer.
Sigma vs NWEO Recap
3-1 for Sigma
MVP: matg
Sigma proved in this series once again that they are an elite team. Despite that solo queue is not going well for this team this season(only Griffun their support has a positive win rate in solo queue) they are elite when it comes to team play. Sigma lost game 2 of this series due to a crazy carry performance from Denali the King of NWEO on Lilia. But in their 3 wins, Sigma was able to win every game within 30 minutes. NWEO was only able to get 9 towers in the 4 games and 7 of those were in their game 2 victory. Sigma got 34 towers in this series in comparison. Draft this series was interesting as both teams with the blue side 1st pick took an ADC the entire series. There were no real surprise picks for Sigma in this series; they played the stuff that they played all season and did it well. No one on Sigma had a bad series but the 2 standout players were Matg(and his support Griffun) and Nuffies. matg averaged almost 1k dmg a minute in this series which is crazy to see especially considering he was mostly playing Jinx and other immobile carries into tons of dive threats.
First Class VS Nu Recap
3-2 for First Class
MVP: FC Solem
So first off I'd like to say I'm incredibly surprised that this series went the full distance. I thought that Dorado Gaming Nu was going to be able to take this series quite easily. Both these teams heading into this series had almost identical team stats and it showed just how evenly matched they were. Teams went back and forth on taking games in the series the whole way through. FC would win a game smashing Nu only for them to bounce back and win the 2nd game. And then the cycle would repeat. Aphelios was one of the major power picks in this series as well interestingly enough as Jinx was on the ban table for this series. Game 5 ended in a banger I wish I could have watched it. It's the game 5 that every team dreams of playing. There were 42 kills in 39 minutes, 3 barons taken, 6 dragons, and both rifts taken. FC Solem in the mid-lane gets my MVP vote as they were able to get the largest individual gold leads for FC in this series and had the least deaths on the team.
Oblivion Esports Ruby VS Xg Lightning
My Prediction: 3 - 1 for XGL
Lane To Watch: Bot Lane
So in the playoffs both XGL and OER were able to take fairly dominant victories. This came as a surprise to me as of all the matchups last week I thought that XGL vs TEA would have been the closest series out of all of the quarterfinals but it was a complete blowout instead. OER as the series continued got better and better, winning quicker and with fewer mistakes. Both XGL and OER were not afraid to show the depth of their playbooks picking plenty of different champions across their series. I think this series should go in the favor of XGL. They have shown me that they can carry through multiple lanes and know how to win a game quickly. This is almost the complete reverse of OER who play to scale and play through bot lane exclusively. There is potetional here yet again for another blowout on the side of XGL. This series is going to come down once again to the bot lane. Both Juiiceboxx and Ravensman have been dominant if either can get a lead going for their team it will matter a lot. I expect that both junglers are going to be looking to path to bot lane and make plays here.
OER Key points to Win
Ensure that Ravensman & KneoStorm have a lane that they can win. XGL is not afraid to play for early-game aggression in the bot lane. If you are going to keep taking your support in the 2nd half of the draft ensure that KneoStorm has picked something that delivers a big impact. If you guys are taking Rakan or Nautilus in phase 2 that was a mistake.
XGL is not afraid to play a team comp that is a very aggressive and early game focused. Ensure that every game you have at least 1 winning lane to bail your team out and make games go longer.
XG takes mid-counter-pick whenever they can make sure you cover yourself in round 2 bans
Have a plan for different types of junglers. If XG 1st picks kindred or graves, something that hard farms don't pick a tank and put your team on the backfoot the entire early game.
Having clear engage ults and win cons is how you guys win please keep drafting at least 1 of these every game
XGL also focuses a lot on taking tons of CC in their games. Cleanse should be a high consideration
Get some early wards on objectives. XGL was able to get almost every 1st neutral in all their games. At least trade rifts for dragons or vice versa
XGL Key Points to Win
OER Likes to keep games slow and scale. You guys are the opposite, make sure that your early plays pay off.
OER is going to take their ADC early make sure you have a preferred AD matchup available that can work in the early game like Juiiceboxx enjoys playing
Look to keep split push options open. OER drafts a lot of really hard engage, team fighting them might not always be the best decision
Again Cleanse on ADCs is probably important in this series most of the time.
Be wary of the Naut flex
Focus Ravensman every fight they are the big carry and will be playing a hyper carry
Dorado Gaming Sigma VS First Class
My Prediction: 3-1 For Sigma
Lane To Watch: Jungle
So the question on everyone's mind coming into this series is can First Class slay another Dorado gaming team? First Class were the underdogs in their series last week it's fair to say despite being the higher seed. In my playoff prediction and many others, we saw most people taking Nu over FC. But this week FC is playing the overall tournament favorites. As good as Nu was Sigma is better. FC was tied or had better stats than those of Nu. Sigma clears FC in the stats department. Sigma had a more clean prior series as well being much more dominant in their wins they are the heavy favorites for this series. Sigma and FC are teams that look to close the game out with barons. I expect that the baron dance is going to be the most pivotal part of this series. These are the 2 best teams in the entire league at claiming the buff. Who will be able to get vision early and defend it? Who is going to get picked off looking to ward it? How many team fights will start over pink wards in the river?
Key Points for FC to Win
Can you get any of the 3 power picks that your team has in this series? If they are open I strongly suggest you take them. If not Sigma is going to be heavily constrained with their bans and as FC you need to take advantage.
Make sure that if Sigma is giving up the first set of neutrals as they tend to that you are taking advantage of the map somewhere. Get a tower dive into a dragon take don’t just settle for the small neutral win.
Have a Jinx counter pick ready. Last week you guys had some ideas that did not work and eventually, you chose to ban it every game. Is there something new this week?
If slooter chooses to opt into the bruiser/fighter top lane are you ready to support the top side of your map? Sigma normally gives a counter-pick to their top laner same as you. What blind picks does FC bruiser2012 have?
Griffun is playing entirely for peel in the support role. Are you going to choose to match this or look to counter it?
Banger in the Jungle has lots of early invasion champions. Make sure that you are ready to get early vision, especially on slower clearing junglers that FC truest sometimes plays.
Make sure you always have some sort of vision towards Baron. Sigma is the only team with better Baron stats than you.
Get FC bruiser2012 to buy some pink wards. How they can play in a series and not buy a pink every game is nuts.
Key Points for Sigma to Win
Have someone to peel for matg. Jinx and the other hyper carries need someone to help them out. The rest of your team almost always plays for peel and dive make sure that someone is able to help your bot lane.
Make sure that you either have bans prepared or counter-picks for the 3 picks that FC will take almost every time that they are up.
FC is also a top-side counter-pick team. You guys have the advantage in that as slooter does play some tanks make sure that you have some bans in round 2 to make your top lane playable.
First Class is another team that plays really well when they get to the late game. Make sure you are able to have the win conditions ready to close out a game. Don’t get complacent if you are winning early.
FC does have some interesting jungle picks in their pocket. Make sure you are ready for Bel’Veth and Udyr.
Piece Pipe 13 has really started to step it up in the wins for FC. Ensure that you are focusing them in team fights on the less mobile hyper carries that they prefer.
Baron vision control is going to be pivotal in this series. Make sure that you have a warding buddy and do not get picked off.
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