There's still one more week to go in the Oceanic Pro League's regular season, but our playoff teams have already been locked in. Barring an Exile 5 upset, LG Dire Wolves are all but locked in for the top seed in the final. Legacy Esports are likely to finish in second with Chiefs Esports Club closely following behind at third. Lastly, Sin Gaming and Avant Garde will play next week in a match that won't have any implications beyond choice of side in their gauntlet match.
And then there's a bunch of weak teams at the bottom, but we'll worry about that come relegation time.
Play of the Week
Ah, Jayke. We've all been there, my friend. A lone support defending a tower against three big, mean, ugly dudes, probably yelling something like "Yo, where the help at?" into his mic in a flustered yet resigned fashion.
And that's where the similarities between solo queue supports and Jayke end. See, in solo queue, while you're desperately firing off Rank 3 Glitterlances into the creep wave, your jungler is probably farming Scuttle Crab on the other side of the map. Your mid is busy playing 4D chess against his lane opponent (read: not looking at anything other than the next creep he's going to last hit) and your AD carry is dead.
In the OPL, your top laner is Evan 'Ceres' Mascarenhas, and he sets up a perfect flank with Teleport, empties his Cuban warlord weapons cache of CC on the three helpless siegers, and helps your team pick up three kills.
And then you lose anyway, but hey, progress.
Avant Garde v Legacy Esports
Result: 2-0 Legacy Esports
After their 2-0 hiccup at the hands of Sin, Legacy came into Game 1 looking for a statement win. Avant's quick thinking in our Play of the Week got them off to a rocky start, but some disciplined carry play from Brandon 'Claire' Nguyen and Lawrence 'Lost' Hui gave Legacy the win. The young pair finished with a combined statline of 14/2/25.
Avant weren't discouraged in Game 2, firing jabs straight out of their corner to set Myles 'Blinky' Irvine up with four early kills. Avant tore through Legacy's towers, growing their gold lead to a whopping 6k at 18 minutes. But from that point onwards, it almost seemed as if Legacy had intentionally played themselves into a hole to get some practice coming back into a losing game. Staking their game on Mountain Drakes, they managed to beat Avant around neutral objectives despite never actually having a gold lead.
Chiefs Esports Club v LG Dire Wolves
Result: LG Dire Wolves 2-0
Riding the high from their win over Exile 5, the baby Chiefs were in for a rude awakening in Game 1 thanks to Shern 'Shernfire' Tai, who ran a train on them in the early game on Rengar. It was just another Saturday for the Wolves as they rampaged to a 26-minute win without dropping any objectives.
Game 2 was another blowout for the Wolves, who decisively won in the early game, finishing the game 27-4 in kills. Shernfire racked up a 12/1/8 scoreline, leading the Wolves to a second win with all their towers still standing.
Sin Gaming v Abyss eSports Club
Result: 2-0 Sin Gaming
Sin pulled off a Dire Wolves performance of their own in Game 1, blowing Abyss out with a hyper aggressive five-carry lineup spearheaded by Cuong 'Flaresz' Ta's 5/0/6 Rumble. Abyss fell in just 21 minutes without a single objective to their name.
Abyss showed more fight in Game 2, going blow for blow for the first 12 minutes of the game. But one fight blew the game wide open for Sin as they traded two for four, breaking down towers with the relentless siege machine that was Victor 'FBI' Huang's 7/0/12 Varus.
Tainted Minds v Exile 5
Result: 2-1 Tainted Minds
Despite having nothing to play for, Exile 5 put up a strong showing in Game 1 as some early movement by Christopher 'ChrisMisTrees' Trease's Cassiopeia saw them climb in kill count. Stalwart map play handed them a slew of objectives despite Abyss' early tower lead, and ChrisMisTrees was free to wreak havoc in the absence of any real dive threats on TM's side.
The dominance of Game 1 was nowhere to be seen by x5 in Game 2 as Jordan 'Only' Middleton put up another stellar performance on Lee Sin. Unable to get any sort of handhold in the game, x5 were thoroughly thumped with a kill score of 3-25 with new TM support Isaac 'Tilting' Bellamy doing the opposite of his name with a slick 0/0/15 Karma game.
Exile 5 looked ready to regroup in Game 3, but things went south from the get-go with some pre-creeps action resulting in two kills for TM. Although ChrisMisTrees was able to nab a double kill in some roaming action, TM's buffer was too large, and they mercifully ended x5 in under 22 minutes.
The Oceanic Pro League's regular season concludes this Saturday from 3 PM AEST as Chiefs Esports Club return to take on Tainted Minds. Watch live at http://oce.lolesports.com.