The second round of LCS 2020 Summer lower bracket is here and it will feature 100 Thieves going against Evil Geniuses, who are coming into the match following a 2-3 loss to FlyQuest on Friday.
Even though Evil Geniuses almost produced a reverse sweep against FlyQuest last time out, I am still not convinced with this team and their potential to go far. Unlike what the 2-3 scoreline would suggest, Evil Genuises were a far worse team and won only because FlyQuest somehow blundered their draft and fell apart in games three and four.
Starting off in the top lane, Huni is still an over-hyped player who might be the World Championship grand finalist, but those times are long behind him. His laning phase is one of the worst in the league and his overly-aggressive playstyle without any consideration about the situation of the game is extremely worrying here, especially since he is going against Ssumday. Unlike Huni, who is in my book one of the worst top laners still in the playoffs, Ssumday, on his best day, is by far the best top laner in the LCS.
Ssumday looked very solid in the latter stages of the regular season, especially on Camille and other more carry-oriented champions, which is exactly what 100T should look to play around here. Without going into too much detail about Ssumday v Huni stats, Ssumday is a far better and more valuable player than Huni and is on top of that very efficient in lane, whereas Huni is ranked second-worst laning top laner in the league.
Moving down to the mid lane, I am a bit concerned with 100T’s Ryoma, who is a prime example of a hit-or-miss player and I am confident that if 100T would replace him with a more consistent player they would look much better. Having said that, Ryoma has seemingly found his calling in picking Galio, which is a perfect champion for him and quite frankly for 100T’s playstyle.
Ryoma will be facing Goldenglue, who had an up and down performance against FlyQuest. He “ran it down” in games one and two, accumulating a 1/11/5 record, but looked somewhat better in games three and four, where he combined 7/1/10, only to close out the series with 2/3/2. Again, I would like to emphasize EG looked better in game three and four due to their better draft and not necessarily due to their stronger individual performances.
As for the jungle match-up, Svenskeren will clash with Contractz, who has looked substantially better than EG’s jungler this split. Even though he played only 12 games, Contractz managed a 4.2 KDA, 69.9% KP and a fairly solid 169 GD @15, which are all higher marks than Svenskeren’s. Still, Contractz tends to be more of a liability in a mid-late game which is of course not optimal.
The bottom lane is very tricky to evaluate. Bang and Zeyzal on the side of EG did not show anything spectacular against FlyQuest but they were not exactly bad. The problem with 100T is the fact that they will be playing with support Poome, who is a rookie player. What’s more, he only started playing LoL a couple of months ago and while seeing how he went from an amateur player to LCS in less than a year is very impressive, it also means he lacks the experience.
Looking at Poome play, he can either look exceptionally good or very bad, which is another hit-or-miss player on 100T. Nevertheless, EG have plenty of that as well.
As for the ADC match-up, Cody Sun has been putting up better numbers than Bang with 4.7 KDA and 64.1% KP, but is averaging worse numbers in the lane with -312 GD @15 compared to Bang’s 132 GD @15. So in short, Cody Sun is better in mid-late game, whereas Bang is slightly better in lane – even though that did not show against FlyQuest.
Looking at Evil Geniuses, they seem like a team that can lose to anyone, while 100T can win only if they either get Ssumday ahead or if Ryoma has one of his pop-off games. Since 100T’s main win condition is counting on Ssumday, it’s safe to assume the opposing teams will do everything in their power to ban out his champions and play around the top lane but I’m not sure EG can pull that off with Huni.
The bottom lane looks very 50/50 and something similar can be said about the mid lane, although due to Ryoma’s iffy performances, we should give EG a slight edge in that department. The jungle match-up is another huge enigma since Contractz can be hit-or-miss and usually does little to help his team in the mid-late game, whereas Svenskeren is just not performing well.
I’m not too big on either team due to their inconsistencies and clear problems, but at the end of the day, if 100T can pull out at least half-decent drafts, play around Ssumday and count on Ryoma to not fall apart, they should edge out a win against EG.
Prediction: 100 Thieves to win – 2.54
