Team Liquid brings down Team Impulse to secure 3rd place, possible Worlds trip
It was a series of comebacks for Team Liquid in New York's famed Madison Square Garden this weekend. Each of their victories in their 3-1 series against Team Impulse saw them going down 3, 4, even 5,000 gold down in the early stages of the game, forcing them to claw their way back from the brink of defeat. When the final Nexus went down, they had taken 3rd place in the 2015 NA LCS Summer Split Playoffs.
Despite the near-dire situations, Team Liquid top laner Diego “Quas” Ruiz didn't let the deficits get him down. He had faith that his team knew what to do. "Previously, we've struggled with being behind in the early game because we played too passive all throughout," he told us. "But now, I think we've found a good way of picking good fights even when we're behind, knowing what power spikes we have to wait for, and find the fights immediately after, and not wait any longer."
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By taking advantage the veteran experience that he, jungler Christian IWDominate Rivera, mid laner Jae-hoon “FeniX” Kim, AD carry (and World Champion) Gwang-jin “Piglet” Chae, and support Alex "Xpecial" Chu have all accrued over years of professional play, they were able to keep their cool and rake in the wins.
They were, of course, bolstered by the massive crowd that packed out Madison Square Garden to watch the match. According to Quas, the team could feel the crowd's reaction during each and every big play.
"When we stole the Baron [in Game 4], everyone got so excited," he said, remembering the moment and chuckling to himself. "I kind of jumped out of my chair a little bit there. You definitely go with the crowd. When something big happens in the game, they react, and you react to them. It moves you."
That Baron theft by FeniX -- undeniably one of the biggest highlights of the match -- may just exemplify the back-and-forth nature of the series. After an extended brawl that took the two squads from the Baron pit to Impulse's second-tier turret, Team Liquid had to limp back to base, opening up Baron Nashor for Impulse's double Teleport comp to take with ease.
That is, if FeniX and his Orianna hadn't shown up. Explains Quas, "The only thing left to do was go for a steal."
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And steal it he did. One spectacularly timed Command: Shockwave later, Liquid had that powerful purple aura floating around them, and rapidly made their way to the bottom lane, hoping to shove down turrets.
One would think that, even with the Baron buff on his side, Quas would still be nervous about closing out incredibly close game. But he knew better. "Right after we got it, I thought, 'Okay, we got it. It's locked down. We can't lose from here.' I got really excited from that. I knew we had won at that point."
After yet another deadly Shockwave from FeniX, they had wiped out Team Impulse's roster and taken the Nexus. As they stood from their keyboards and congratulated one another, they all knew one thing: With that win, they could be heading to Worlds.
Their destiny is now in Team SoloMid and Counter Logic Gaming's hands. Given a victory by TSM tomorrow, Liquid would automatically qualify for Worlds as the second seed, due to the Championship Points they earned with their 3rd place finish in the 2015 NA LCS Spring Split. If CLG wins, Liquid will have to go into the Regional Qualifier gauntlet in order to play for the third and final ticket to Europe this fall.
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Quas knows there's a lot they need to improve on before then, however. "we have to improve our drafting, and knowing what our strengths are and exploiting that," he says. "We can do a lot better at coordinating plays around the map. A lot of times, we prepare for stuff and don't pull it off correctly and fall behind because of that. We need to communicate better, talk more, and we can do better...If TSM wins tomorrow and we go to Worlds, I think we'll get a lot better."
Will TSM bring down CLG and punch Team Liquid's ticket to Worlds? Keep your eye on Lolesports to find out. And if you've missed any of the action from Madison Square Garden this weekend, make sure to head over to the spoiler-free VODs page to catch up on all the excitement.
