David beat Goliath. The new Royal Roaders on the block, Team Dynamics, slayed three-time World Champions T1 in an intense three-game series in Week 4 of LCK Summer 2020.
Team Dynamics vs. T1 was meant to be the start of a relatively one-sided final day of LCK action for Week 4. However, it turned out to be one of the closest games of the season so far.
The CK Royal Roaders were shut down in the first game by their much more experienced counterparts. T1, off the back of some mistakes from Dynamics, turned an early game lead into complete late-game domination.
Lee “Faker” Sang-hyeok was at the forefront of T1’s assault. The Unkillable Demon King himself might have been felled twice, but his Corki was key to shutting down the carries of Dynamics. While his mid lane opponent, Lee “Kuzan” Seong-hyeok tried his best to find picks on Azir, it wasn’t enough.
Game 2 was a different story though. The Faker of HOTS, Lee “Rich” Jae-won, startled his top lane opponent Kim “Canna” Chang-dong. LCK’s King of Solo Kills was taken down by the three-time World Champion — of a different title — with Rich putting in yet another dominant Lucian performance to tie the series up.
“I feel like Lucian top works if you are confident in the pick. I practiced it a lot into Jayce to prepare for Canna. In Game 2, I was going to pick either Lucian or Aatrox, but because T1 plays more passively, I wanted to play Lucian to make more aggressive plays,” said Rich in the post game interview.
“The extra Q range [after Lucian’s buffs on Patch 10.13] is really nice, so you can take winning trades in the laning phase and force them to use Teleport early.”
After two lop-sided affairs, Game 3 was anything but. The 50 minute slugfest wasn’t as bloody as the DRX vs Damwon series earlier in the week, but it sat tantalizingly on a knife’s edge for over half an hour.
From the 20 minute mark onwards, it became a battle between Park “Teddy” Jin-seong and Dynamics. T1 funneled resources into the Aphelios, with Faker even dusting off the Lulu mid from yesteryear to try and buff up the hypercarry.
However, T1’s objective focus cost them. They gave away three Dragons with no contest, and by the time Dynamics was contesting for Soul, T1 were behind the 8-ball. Dynamics even managed to sneak away the first Baron, thanks to Kim “GuGer” Do-yeop’s Bard. T1 were crumbling under the pressure, even though it should have been their foes in the hot seat.
Eventually, the knife slipped, and it went straight into T1’s jugular. After two Elder Drakes, multiple Barons, and ping-ponging fights, Dynamics finally got what they were looking for — Teddy. Despite the Aphelios being close to taking Dynamics down in not one, but two teamfights before the end of the game, a pin-point Bard ultimate from GuGer spelt the end of Teddy’s reign on the Rift, and ultimately T1’s final foothold on the game.
Running it in with the dregs of the second Elder, Dynamics were elated as they caused the upset of the week in the LCK — a high bar given it was set by a TusiN-less KT against DRX.
For Seo “Deokdam” Dae-gil, who cemented his second POG of the split in Game 3 with a 9/1/4 performance on Ezreal, it was a fine return to form after a couple of off weeks.
“First off, my form was really bad lately, so I was worried about playing against T1,” he told the LCK casters. “However, in the last game, I did a really great job [on Ezreal], so maybe my form is coming back. It feels really nice.”
He did shout out his support, GuGer, for the assist though. The veteran’s Bard was on point throughout the series, with clutch Tempered Fates helping shut down T1’s single-carry compositions in Games 2 and 3.
“GuGer really supports me really well, and adjusts to how I play in every game,” Deokdam said. “He always sets me up to try and play perfectly.”
The road doesn’t end here for Dynamics though. While they might have taken down the Spring 2020 champions, their hardest task arguably lays ahead of them with a series against Damwon. Depending on who you ask though, the team is feeling somewhere between confident and petrified of the hyper-aggressive squad.
“If we lost today, we would have had no confidence leading up to our game against Damwon,” Rich admitted. “Since we won, we should be able to give it a good shot. I’m not confident about playing against Nuguri, but we will do our best.”
Deokdam had a different story. “After we won the game, Rich said he was going to wreck Nuguri,” he joked, outing Rich.
The AD carry did have thoughts of his own though. “Now that I’ve taken down Teddy, I should be able to beat Ghost,” he stated confidently.
Dynamics will take on Damwon on July 15.
