Cloud 9's Cinderella Story

I couldn't find a good representation of this anywhere, no articles detailing Cloud 9's entire season, so hopefully this will be what I need. Haha.

This year is a year that Cloud 9 League of Legends fans will tell stories about for as long as League of Legends lives. Last year, after just barely losing to TSM in the NA Finals, Cloud 9's mid laner Hai stepped down. He stated that it wasn't because of the haters saying he'd lost his game, but for more personal matters, which was the case, due to his wrist injury, but I felt like the hate against him did contribute a little bit. Signing on Incarnation, the #1 playing in European solo que that year, people had high hopes for Cloud 9. "Now that the under performing Hai is gone, C9 will be a new team, ready to crush the competition again." However, that was not the case. Cloud 9 absolutely fell apart durring the beginning of the summer split. Incarnation was not living up to the hype, team synergy was at an all-time low, and Meteos, the former jungler couldn't handle the pressure of shot-calling, and so when they needed good calls the most, it just wasn't there. It turns out that it actually wasn't Hai holding the team back, it was Meteos. In the middle of the split, Meteos stepped down as Cloud 9's jungler, and they Subbed Hai in for him. Immediately, the difference showed. Even though Hai's jungle performance was not the best, as to be expected coming from a former mid-laner transitioning into a new role, his immaculate shot-calling won them the games they needed. At one point, Cloud 9 was ONE GAME away from being auto-relegated and losing their spot in the LCS, and they turned that around, forcing TDK down to 10th and auto-relegation instead. Next came the speed bump of 7th place, keeping them out of the promotion tournament, and guaranteeing them their spot in the LCS for next split, In a tie breaker vs Team 8, they won that. C9 Seemed happy with themselves. They got what they wanted, kept themselves in the LCS, and that was all they needed to content themselves with the split. However, it didn't end there. C9's newfound Success was only just beginning. With the likes of TL losing several more games, C9 just barely scraped by into the North American Regional Qualifier, in which if they ran a gauntlet winning Best of 5 Series against three other teams, Cloud 9 could go to the World Championship. It looked bad against their first opponent, Gravity. Gravity had at one point held the #1 position in the summer split, and were a much better team than Cloud 9 on paper. As was the case with Team Impulse and Team Liquid, their other gauntlet opponents, should they beat Gravity. Which they did. The most of the predictions were for Cloud 9 to lose, and I think even the C9 fans like myself didn't expect them to win, but sure enough, down 0-2 against Gravity, Cloud 9 pulls off the reverse sweep to win against Gravity, and move on to face Team Impulse. The next day, Cloud 9 found themselves in a similar situation against Impulse, down 0-2 with everyone doubting they would win, but sure enough, back to back, they pulled of the reverse sweep a second time. At that point, C9 was no longer the underdog, they actually had a good shot at beating Team Liquid and making it to worlds. No longer was anyone doubting them, and sure enough, it happened. With Sneaky's pocket pick, Draven, counterpicking it into Piglet's vayne, Sneaky almost single-handedly carried Cloud 9 to worlds in a 3-1 victory vs Liquid. What an incredible feat already, to go from 9th place, one game away from being locked into 10th, to finish the regular season in 7th, avoid the promotion tournament, and then use their championship points from the spring split to run the gauntlet and qualify for Worlds. It was already a story that was too good to be true, but it gets even better. When the worlds tournament first started to pan out, I was absolutely TERRIFIED when I saw the #1 team from Europe, that went undefeated in their regular season, Fnatic get paired in a group with C9. I threw in the towel right there. When I saw C9 in a group with Fnatic, I said, nope, C9 isn't winning worlds. Boy was I wrong. This week, C9 showed everyone that during the month in between when they won the gauntlet, and their appearance at the World Championship, they turned into a force to be reckoned with. Incarnation is playing extremely confidently, not scared of anyone, and crushing his lane. Sneaky is performing outstandingly, consistently winning his lane and getting ahead of the enemy AD carry. Hai has become an incredible jungler, pulling off mad plays I didn't even know were possible before he showed me otherwise, and even Balls, the person who people said was most underperforming on the team, pulled out a win against Fnatic today with a PENTAKILL, yes, the person who people said was "Underperforming" Got a PENTAKILL against the #1 Team from Europe. Cloud 9 looks better and better every game, they almost look unstoppable. What do you do against them? You only have so many things you can ban each game. If you try to ban out their tower siege comp, then the power picks make it through, like Mordekaiser and Gangplank, and Lulu. Sure, you can snag Morde first pick if you're blue, but then C9 takes Gangplank AND Lulu second rotation, and stomps your life. In my eyes, playing against C9 is like playing against Teemo, in their current state, there just doesnt seem to be any room for counterplay at all. Their team cohesion, their dominant laners, their off-meta picks that you can't ban out unless you wana let real powerhouses through, It just doesn't seem like there is any way to counter them, just like playing against Teemo. When you play against Teemo, he is just so annoying, it just feels like there is no room for counter-play. Currently, Cloud 9 leads their group undefeated at 3-0, and it only looks to get better. This year at worlds seems to be the closest its ever been in terms of skill level of teams. Anybody could've won this tournament, but right now, it seems like NA actually has a good chance. We're winning, and with C9 leading the charge, I think NA could manage to take our first Summoner's Cup home this year.

༼ つ ◕◕ ༽つ C9.....take my energy..... and good luck to you boys.༼ つ ◕◕ ༽つ