100 Thieves completed their first week of LCS competition with a 1-1 record.
Week One
The first week of LCS kicked off this past weekend and went much different than expected. Team Dignitas along with FlyQuest join Cloud9 atop the standings, and Team SoloMid is tied for last place.
100 Thieves find themselves with a 1-1 record after the first week, but many questions still remain. Is William “Meteos” Hartman going to shake off his sickness and make up for an abysmal start to the split? Will Tommy “Ryoma” Le be able to keep up with other Mid-Laners without farming efficiently? Hopefully, these questions will both be answered positively and soon for 100 Thieves.
100 Thieves vs. Golden Guardians
Result: W (1-0)
Almost everyone had the Thieves winning this game against a team most people pegged as the worst in the LCS. What most people didn’t see coming was how close it would be. Thanks to a few early-game invades, Meteos was set behind for a majority of the game.
Can “Closer” Çelik took this advantage and ran with it, securing the infernal soul for GG in under 25 minutes. 100 Thieves were able to keep up in gold thanks to Kim “Ssumday” Chan-ho and Sun “Cody Sun” Li-Yu, but the game would have likely been in a much more grim state if not for the scaling capability of their team composition.
Luckily Meteos was able to steal the Elder Dragon, and with Baron Nashor, the team ended the game shortly thereafter. While a win is a win, 100 Thieves had no chance of winning the game without Elder, and it very well was Golden Guardians’ match to lose. Lose it they did.
100 Thieves vs. Evil Geniuses
Result: L (1-1)
Not much was learned about either team heading into this Monday Night League showdown. EG lost to a great team in Cloud9, and 100T struggled against one of the worst but had emerged victorious.
The Thieves once again had awful drake control, only managing to secure one of the five during the game. While they were able to keep up in gold, there was no miracle Elder steal for them this time, and as such, the loss was inevitable.
Former marksman Bae “Bang” Jun-sik had an amazing game, finishing with a 7/0/4 scoreline. More importantly, he had earned a win over the team he was traded from. After two games, there is much left to be answered. While week one of the LCS wasn’t all too crazy, there were four clear takeaways for 100 Thieves.
1. Ssumday is Back
To just about no one’s surprise, Ssumday returned to the LCS just as good as he left it. During week 1, Ssumday ranked 3rd in KDA(4.0), while being ranked 1st in CS(349), CS per minute(9.04), Gold per minute(431) and Gold share(26.4%).
Winning lane against the likes of Kevin “Hauntzer” Yarnell and Colin “Kumo” Zhao isn’t all that much to write home about, and Ssumday will have his chance to stand out even more as he faces off against Ruin and Licorice this weekend.
2. Meteos: Feel better, Play better
Meteos had stated he was feeling under the weather before the first week of LCS, and fans could see it clearly by the hoarseness of his voice during the post-game interview. Sick or not, Meteos had an awful first showing.
Registering an atrocious 0.86 KDA while being the only jungler in the league without a single kill is not a good look. Hopefully, he’s in higher spirits next week as the team will need him to perform better.
3. Drakes. Acknowledge them.
Since “Rise of the Elements” began, drakes have had a much bigger priority. Souls are very strong buffs, and it would do the Thieves a big favor to not give them away like they’re on clearance. In week one, 100 Thieves managed to get two dragons. TWO.
One of them was a game-winning steal on Elder, and the other was their only real drake take of the weekend. If 100T wants to progress further, it would do them some good to at least prevent the opposing side from getting a soul so easily.
4. Don’t panic, Ryoma will be fine.
Following his not so great game on Monday, Ryoma got a lot of flak for his performance. While Tommy certainly didn’t have a superstar weekend, he had great moments and showed flashes of the potential PapaSmithy saw when choosing him for the Mid Lane.
During his game against Golden Guardians, the game state was horrible for Ryoma, as he was forced to suffer in a Zoe-Leblanc side lane matchup, while simultaneously giving up farm to his two carries. His CS numbers should be overlooked, as they were nowhere near as bad in game two.
During game two, Ryoma was met by three enemy champions under tower before level six and proceeded to make a few reckless rookie mistakes.
Ryoma still managed to show one small glimmer of mechanical prowess, but it was vastly overshadowed by a handful of inexcusable mistakes. Expect Ryoma to grow throughout the course of the next few weeks as he acclimates to the new region.
Featured screencap courtesy of Riot Games.
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