The Recap - NA LCS Week 5

In a week where fans expected their favorite teams to step up, very little ground was made for the coveted No. 1 spot. With every single NA LCS team going 1-1 this week, the three way tie between LMQ, Counter Logic Gaming, and Dignitas will have to wait until Week 6 to be broken.

Games of the Week

LMQ vs Counter Logic Gaming Looking to separate themselves from LMQ in their quest for No. 1, CLG's carries continued to excel during laning phase and team-fights. Even with XiaoWeiXiao on Kassadin, Link's Orianna outpaced LMQ's mid lane in farm by regularly shoving the lane and keeping XiaoWeiXiao last hitting under his turret. Several Command: Shockwaves knocked LMQ dizzy and gave CLG a big advantage to pick up several key kills and dominating control over Dragon. CLG's bot lane kept Vasilii’s Caitlyn on the defensive as Aphromoo's Morgana maintained a 100% kill participation while Doublelift's Jinx finished the match with a game high KDA of 10-2-8. Team SoloMid vs Evil Geniuses For a second week in a row, TSM brought out Corki for WildTurtle and found great success. With the team assembling another composition heavy on AD damage, the mix of magical and true damage from the Daring Bombardier was a welcome addition to the team. Despite getting ahead in the early game, Bjergsen became overconfident in a play in the bot lane and turned over two kills to keep EG in the game. While Amazing made TSM’s first pick of Lee Sin extremely worthwhile, Dyrus’ Shyvana consistently pushed Innox’s Jax to his turret and kept EG’s top lane at bay. With no answer to WildTurtle, who had completed Trinity Force, Bloodthrister, and Infinity Edge in an impressive time, EG saw their base overrun after a devastating Baron fight. Counter Logic Gaming vs Curse With a first time Lulu for Seraph and Kayle for Quas, the showdown between CLG and Curse had a number of twists and turns. CLG kept an early game lead off the aggressive plays from dexter's Lee Sin and transitioned into a very swift push down mid lane for the inner turret. However, Curse's situation turned around after they snuck a Baron while two players of CLG were busy in the bot lane. As CLG reacted to Curse's Baron call too slowly, Curse began to pick up pace and knock down turrets one after another. Off of Xpecial's solid Thresh Death Sentences, Curse managed to find multiple kills when CLG was least prepared. Finally, a second uncontested Baron all but signaled the end for CLG.

Biggest Surprise

NA teams taking a page out of the EU LCS? In a major turnaround from spring split, many of the top 4 teams have been dropping a number of matches to the bottom 4 teams. Even for compLexity, a team tied for No. 8 with a 3-9 record, two of their wins have been against Cloud9 and Dignitas. This level of parity has been unexpected for the NA LCS, a region where there has regularly been a clear distinction between a favorite team and an underdog. Top 4 teams are not only missing out on crucial wins that may have an impact on their seeding for the summer split playoffs but they are lacking on the consistency and confidence that they will depend upon as the 2014 season continues. While these upsets make for a more exciting summer split, NA teams have to remember that parity isn't always a good thing, especially with the World Championships looming around the corner.

Biggest Disappointment

Dignitas - unprepared early game For a team in contention for the No. 1 spot, Dignitas was on the receiving end of the most one-sided loss of the week. It started out well for them as they controlled three out of the four buffs in the opening minutes of the game but everything went awry for Dignitas shortly after. With his blue buff stolen, Kez roamed top for an early game and picked up First Blood on ZionSpartan and Westrice maintained his lead over ZionSpartan for the rest of the match. Crumbzz was frequently caught out of position in his ganks and even missed Flashing over a wall. In all, the game was an incredibly poor showing for Dignitas who succumbbed to defeat after going 1-14 in kills in a 33 minute game. Dignitas will certainly need to review their early game approach if they want to continue their bid for No. 1 against LMQ and CLG.

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