Games are longer during placement.
At this point I'm starting to suspect that it's not Riot that's making games faster but the players themselves. I've had many games where there was a lead but it dragged on over 35 minutes because the losing team refused to ff and kept on trying. This is a huge contrast compared to in season where players stop giving a shit after first blood which causes short games. Other than addressing the so called power-creep, we also need to address the shitty ff attitude in ranked if we want longer, better games. As for me, I'm going to try to get as much game in as possible before this "never give up" mentality disappear again.