After a nail-biting, back-and-forth series against China’s no.1 team Bilibili Gaming Dreamsmart, South Korean powerhouse and Philippines’ fan favorite T1 successfully defended its title, winning a 5th Worlds Championship.
Bilibili Gaming had Bin (Chen Ze-Bin) and Elk (Zhao Jia-Hao) dominating their respective lanes, setting the pace early as T1’s bottom lane struggled for the first time the whole tournament.
BLG was able to set themselves at match point, but T1’s fight was far from over.
As T1 struggled in the early game for most of the series, Hall of Legend and 2023 Asian Games gold medalist Lee Sang Hyeok (Faker), proved the critics wrong, as he tenaciously carried the whole team through his legendary playmaking skills.
Game 5 was close until the 28-minute mark.
BLG found a crucial pick onto the T1’s botlane duo in the river, giving them a 3v5 numbers advantage against T1.
However, with Faker’s Galio heroics and clutch playmaking skills, T1 was able to find a turnaround against BLG, and eventually snowball themselves to a win.
The OPPO Finals’ MVP was won by their franchise player and Korean superstar athlete, Faker, who clinched his 5th Worlds Championship win and 2nd Finals MVP award.
Past, present and future.
It was the second time T1 won back-to-back championships. The last time was in 2015 and 2016, back when the organization was still dubbed as SK Telecom T1. This was also the fourth title won by the player-coach duo of Lee Sang Hyeok and Kim Jeong-gyun (Kkoma).
With the win, T1, as an organization, also extended its winning streak against Chinese teams in a Best-of-5 series to 10-0 (30W-7L).
The roster hasn’t changed since its formation in 2022 and was expected by almost everyone to be the team’s last year playing together. However, with the recent win, fans are pretty optimistic about the future of the team of staying together.
Heavy is the Crown
Before the finals, the annual Worlds opening ceremony featured artists Tiffany Aris, Ash Nikko, Mars Atlas, and Linkin Park, who penned this year’s theme song.
Directed by Hamish Hamilton, who also directed the Oscars, Grammy and Victoria Secret shows, the opening ceremony featured lots of lights and pyrotechnics, with the audience being part of the show through wristbands that reacted automatically on what unfolded throughout the whole series and show.
Here in the Philippines, several watch parties were organized around Metro Manila, including the ones hosted by Riot Games, held at Samsung Hall in SM Aura, and AcadArena’s, co-hosted with Ateneo and UP esports orgs in Cubao.
Arcane
With the pro-scene of League of Legends now over, eyes are now onto the season 2 release of Riot Games’ award-winning series, Arcane.
As part of the show’s promotion, Riot Games announced on its official League of Legends account its upcoming watch party for Arcane for all the fans near Metro Manila.
