Team Liquid Lose Another Ahead of LCS Spring Split Playoffs
By Wyatt Fossett ·
The Echo Fox 'giant slayers' were at it again as the League of Legends Championship Series kicked off its final week of the Spring Split, taking our first-placed Team Liquid.
Hours later and it’s still hard to tell whether or not the Team Liquid heading into the LCS Spring Split Playoffs are looking extremely wounded, or the current line-up on Echo Fox are playing that well against the top-ranked squads. Regardless, Echo Fox walked all over the league-leading Liquid today, and continue to shock the LCS audience.
In our League of Legends Championship Series Week 9 preview, we highlighted the Team Liquid rematch against Team SoloMid, but it was truly their Saturday head-to-head against middle-of-the-pack Echo Fox that shook the ground on which the LCS Arena stands.
Fox Pride
If there’s one thing that team owner Rick Fox can take away from the Echo Fox performance during the LCS Spring Split, even if they don’t wind up making the playoffs, it’s their ability to slay giants.
Undefeated in their last three games, Echo Fox has taken down 2nd seed Cloud 9, and the best squad in the league, Team Liquid. Along the way, they also destroyed 100 thieves, but they are the worst team in the league by a pretty large margin and are considered “free” at this stage.
Prolific Cloud 9 AD-Carry Sneaky called Echo Fox “giant killers” after laughing off their recent loss to the Foxes in his post-game interview today. Current Echo Fox jungler Rush is a huge reason for their recent success and continues to be praised by his fellow LCS players.
WE DID IT AGAIN! YESSS! The boys are truly smurfing. Looking for another 2-0 weekend~
— Echo Fox (@echofoxgg) March 23, 2019
Ggwp @TeamLiquidLoL! Tune in tomorrow for our match against @clgaming ?! #FOXWIN pic.twitter.com/eoOZ6x7Vee
Both Echo Fox and Counter-Logic Gaming won their matches today, which means both are still alive in their fight for the 6th and final playoff spot. Tomorrow, Echo Fox play that exact same CLG team that they’re tied with. This single head-to-head will determine who’s in, and who’s out.
You’re Leaking, Liquid
Probably the biggest headline to focus on as we seep into the final day of the regular season play-in stage is that Team Liquid is bleeding.
Ever since week two, the squad of Impact, Xsmithie, Jensen, Doublelift, and CoreJJ have been the top of the league. It wasn’t until week four that they even lost a single match. But, as the playoffs edge closer, Team Liquid have dropped two of their last three games.
Losing isn’t horrible. Not many teams can go undefeated. But after showing their old form against C9 a few weeks ago, they lost to some teams that they should have easily handled. The ugliest of them, today’s loss to Echo Fox, has TL fans reeling. While there is still time to earn some momentum tomorrow, Team Liquid has to beat the absolutely burning hot TSM team that has already beat them once this split.
Filled Plates on the Last Meal
Tomorrow’s exciting line-up of Week 9 matches will conclude many story-lines as the league wraps its Spring Split. They including both the shaky Team Liquid looking solvable and Echo Fox's hunt for one of the remaining playoff spots.
Other matches on the final day include the talented FlyQuest taking on the Golden Guardians which might just shake up the seeding a bit. There is also one final chance for the 100 Thieves to earn some pride points, as they take on Meteos and the OpTic Gaming crew.
Matches on Sunday, March the 24th, start at 12:00 PM PST and you can catch them live on Twitch, or on the LoLEsports website.