How Team Liquid beat TSM in the LCS Championship to earn a trip to Worlds 2021

Team Liquid are heading to the League of Legends World Championship, and TSM are set to compete in one of the most competitive lower brackets that North American League of Legends has ever seen. Although TSM stood out as the best overall team during the League of Legends Championship Series (LCS) regular season and beat Team Liquid in all five of their summer matchups, Team Liquid continued to show off their newfound prowess in the early game to bolster their immaculate mid-game teamfighting. It wasn’t a close series in the traditional sense -- Team Liquid won 3-1 -- but both teams showed up to compete and made key adjustments throughout each game.

Team Liquid’s early game power in the top lane

Team Liquid beat both Cloud9 and TSM to guarantee a top-three finish in the LCS Championship, but the regular season was far from kind to the team. Between subbing out star top laner Barney “Alphari” Morris for Thomas “Jenkins” Tran and starting jungler Jonathan “Armao” Armao amid Lucas “Santorin” Tao Kilmer Larsen’s health issues, it was difficult for the team to secure a consistent identity. Against Cloud9 and TSM, though, it’s like none of those struggles ever happened.

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When push came to shove, Team Liquid proved itself as the stronger early game team with firm, consistent play around the top side of the map. Alphari is often described as a strong, oppressive laner, but he also makes the opponent work twice as hard when they try to make a play against him. TSM often supported top laner Heo “Huni” Seung-hoon with roams from support Hu “SwordArt” Shuo-Jie, but Team Liquid always won out.

“Me and Jo ‘CoreJJ’ Yong-in were just a better 2v2 top than Huni and SwordArt,” Alphari said in a postgame interview on broadcast.

Alphari smiled on stage and added that he felt TSM were more predictable than Cloud9 and they had no reason not to feel confident. He credited TSM as the second best early game team in the league, but the gap between the teams was apparent all series long.

Photo credit: Riot Games via ESPAT

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“Team Liquid had better control in the side lanes during our series. We had better control in the mid lane, but the early games didn’t roll our way,” TSM coach Soren “Bjergsen” Bjerg said about the matchup. This dynamic was best represented in Team Liquid’s control of the top lane.

Whenever TSM threatened Alphari, Team Liquid perfectly neutralized the pressure and found opportunities elsewhere. When Alphari had the chance to take a lead and run away with it, Team Liquid made the call to push all their resources to the top side of the map. Despite some bumps in the road for Alphari earlier in the year, he and his team continued to show up big in their 2021 LCS Championship run.

TSM prioritizes comfort around mid lane

TSM finished in first place in the regular season by sticking to what it does best -- comfort picks for Tristan “PowerOfEvil” Schrage and focusing their attention on the mid lane. Although other teams struggled to figure out how to win games, TSM marched along and refined this tried-and-tested approach week in and week out. Alongside that approach, scaling compositions were often the focus, but thanks to jungler Mingyi “Spica” Lu, TSM were still competitive in the early game.

Against Team Liquid, TSM continued to focus on one of PowerOfEvil’s longtime power picks, Azir. Azir is one of the best wave clear and teamfight focused mid laners in the game, but often takes time to get to the point where he can single handedly carry a game. That makes the pick more niche, but TSM are a team that likes to play their own meta.

Photo credit: Riot Games via ESPAT

“We’re trying to play our style, our meta and what fits us the best,” PowerOf Evil said in a postgame interview on broadcast. After going down 0-2 in the series, though, TSM weren’t afraid to shake things up. “As you could see, we branched out a little bit and picked other champions and tried other styles and adapted throughout the series. Like picking up the Bard which was really strong against us. We tried out the Wukong in top lane and LeBlanc for more playmaking opportunities. A lot of it came down to certain situations, certain fights.”

Despite losing 1-3 against Team Liquid, the series didn’t feel overwhelmingly one-sided until the concluding game. TSM often made strong cross-map trades whenever Team Liquid managed to take another advantage, even trading inhibitors in Game 2 while Huni struggled topside. Part of that is due to the team’s strong control in mid lane from PowerOfEvil’s Azir, but the heads-up nature of TSM’s macro play deserves credit. It didn’t work out this time, but there’s a lot more League of Legends to be played over the next week.

Moving forward

Team Liquid are set for a bout with 100 Thieves in the semifinals and given the difference of their series records -- Team Liquid defeated both Cloud9 and TSM 3-1 while 100 Thieves narrowly defeated Evil Geniuses 3-2 -- the former is looking heavily favored to make its way into the final. 100 Thieves are strong in the early game, but Team Liquid have already proven that they’re ready to absorb pressure and dish it back twice as hard.

Meanwhile, TSM are preparing for a lower bracket run to secure the final North American seed at the League of Legends World Championship. Immortals stand as a favorable first obstacle, but either Cloud9 or Evil Geniuses will be waiting afterward, eager to knock last year’s LCS champions down a peg. TSM’s greatest advantage is a strong mid lane identity, but their late-season malleability will likely be the key to securing yet another international berth.

Lead photo credit: Riot Games via ESPAT