Worlds 2017 Finals Review: SK Telecom T1 vs. Samsung Galaxy

Qin. Sui. Tang. Liao. Jin. Yuan. Ming. Qing. SKT.

Beijing saw another dynasty fall Saturday night. Samsung Galaxy upset the three-time defending champions SK Telecom T1 3-0 in the Bird’s Nest to take the Summoner’s Cup. For Samsung, it was revenge for last year’s defeat 3-2 in the World Championship final. Their roster, kept intact since that heartbreaking loss, finally found redemption against the greatest organization in League of Legends’ history. I’m sure the sweep made it sweeter.

Few saw Samsung’s utter erasure of SKT coming. The LCK's third seed had looked gangbusters against Longzhu and stalwart against Team WE, but they’d lost twice in group play and were nearly beaten by wildcard 1907 Fenerbahçe Espor. Plus, SKT had swept Samsung two months ago in the LCK gauntlet. Faker’s Lucian broke Crown so badly he was in tears after Game 1. By Game 3, Ruler and CoreJJ were benched in favor of Stitch and Wraith. This was the team supposed to slay a titan?

Yet anyone who followed SKT since their victory at MSI had seen warning signs beneath the mystique. An LCK Summer Split devoid of all threat until it mattered most. A Worlds group stage whose solid 5-1 record and top finish hid an alarming tendency to fall behind early. A quarterfinal with Misfits they were one team fight from losing. A semifinal against Royal they would not have survived without Faker’s Herculean performance on Galio. SKT’s path to finals was littered with the detritus of teams that made more mistakes than they did.

But then, finally, SKT faced a team in SSG that made no mistakes. Suddenly, there were no poorly chosen late-game team fights to turn, no matchups to exploit in lane, no macro errors to punish, no off-meta picks or misexecuted team comps to watch implode. Samsung were patient, brilliant, and above all else, the better team.

While SKT relied heavily on Faker’s otherworldly gifts to paper over their issues, Samsung lacked a cure-all superstar. Without a God to save them, everyone in black needed support each other for optimum team performance. Samsung’s preferred strategy—low-engage with objectives secured through superior vision—demands complete cohesion among team members to succeed. They did so for three straight games.

Every single matchup belied Samsung’s superiority. Bang and Wolf didn’t lose bot lane three games in a row because they’re bad players; Ruler and Corejj were simply stronger. Peanut and Blank didn’t suddenly forget how to gank or pressure lanes; Ambition’s carefully laid vision prevented all of it.

Huni and Faker aren’t poor solo laners. But in Crown and CuVee, they encountered opponents who counter-picked them, exited lane quickly, then out-rotated them. CuVee split pushed better than Huni, and Crown tied Faker to mid lane as best he could to limit the superstar’s roams.

Despite SKT’s (read: Faker’s) best efforts, each game told the same story. Samsung would absorb pressure in the early game, careful not to fall inescapably behind through objective trading and strong laning. Then, they’d seize on a team fight and explode across the map. In Game 1, it was the first Baron fight, a 4-0 victory (that included First Blood) they won despite Peanut’s steal. In Game 2, it was the 5-1 Ace around drake that saw CuVee GNAR! half of SKT after Ambition and Ruler had brought them low with their own ultimate abilities.

Samsung fell behind over seven thousand gold in Game 3, yet one massive 5v5 around Baron allowed them to take the buff and nearly end the game. They’d do so minutes later when Ruler killed Faker with a well-landed Chains of Corruption. This time, it was Faker who ended the game in tears.

In a meta dominated by AD carry play, it was fitting that the Ruler and Bang’s performances dictated their team’s success or failure. Where Ruler was immaculate (10-2-21, 15.5 KDA, 97% KP, 717 DPM, 10.2 CSM), Bang came up well short (4-6-4, 1.3 KDA, 50% KP, 532 DPM, 9.1 CSM). Twice—Games 2&3—SKT built respectable early leads only to watch mispositioning by Bang throw them away. Bang was twice caught out early by Samsung in Game 2, and while Faker roamed to save him the first time, his Flash-ulti into the drake pit (an optimistic chase down of Ambition) was a step too far. A Flash-less ADC then cost SKT a 5-1 Ace, Baron, and six turrets during a team net worth swing of nine thousand gold.

Game 3 was even worse, with Bang pushing Ruler away from a ravenous SKT frontline during a Baron bait, then stepping forward enough for CuVee to Feast him dead nearly in one shot. SKT surrendered another massive gold lead, the Baron, and soon the game.

But to place the blame entirely on Bang’s shoulders is unfair. SKT needed to adapt to a bot-lane focused early game after their Game 1 thumping, but never did. Even Blank’s substitution in Game 3 didn’t solve this issue, with SKT preferring to send their jungler to gank solo lanes instead. Thus Bang and Wolf withered on the vine, unable to draw attention away from Huni’s split push attempts. Faker’s desperate attempts to rectify the situation as Karma in Game 3 resulted in his overextension and death.

SKT’s entire split push-centric strategy—set into stone with the decision to bring Huni to Worlds over Untara—never got off the ground. Instead, they were reduced to imitators, borrowing from Misfits Gaming in favor of any other ideas. IgNar’s Fervor Leona made a second appearance in Wolf’s hands, but to lesser effect. Faker tried on PowerOfEvil’s Karma mid and Huni experimented with Alphari’s Yasuo, but in both cases the originals surpassed their remakes. It was disconcerting watch kkOma, one of the best coaches in League of Legend’s history, steal so heavily from another’s playbook. The team was constructed to split push, not team fight like Misfits, and to mix the two was a mistake.

Give Samsung credit; they battled back twice from significant gold deficits to complete their championship sweep. But there was never any mystery to their strategies. Vision control with an absurd amount of Control Wards plus CuVee’s split push and a snowballing bot lane were key ingredients in all of their victories regardless of how far SKT led. Samsung executed well, but also benefited from SKT’s inability to come up with an answer.

Which brings us to Faker, whose utter devastation after Game 3 will be (wrongly) the only image anyone remembers from this final five years from now. His play ultimately wasn’t enough to rescue a discombobulated side, but he was far from the reason SKT finished second-best. Even God can't 1v5.

While Faker’s uncharacteristic display of emotion in the face of his first series loss at Worlds perhaps signaled the end of an era, I hope we’re merely in the second act of a trilogy. SKT won in 2016, Samsung returned the favor in 2017. What will 2018 bring? Something tells me Faker and a retooled SKT squad will be back terrorizing Korea in no time. For now, all hail the new dynasty: Samsung Galaxy.