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Samsung Galaxy sweep back to back world champions SK telecom T1 in a 3-0 Finals series to win the 2017 League of Legends World Championships.
In one of the most shocking and dominant Finals in Worlds history, Samsung seemed almost destined to lift the Summoner’s Cup. While the early parts of both the second and third games seemed to break in the favor of their opponents, Samsung never lost hope, pulling together as a team, forcing teamfights and beating SK telecom T1 with their own style over and over again.
This is the second world championship win for the Samsung Galaxy organization and third Finals appearance. It was just one year ago, that these two teams met at the Finals of the 2016 World Championship where SKT took the series in a close 3-2 series.
In that series, it was a slight miss-position by Samsung AD Carry Park “Ruler” Jae-hyuk that helped SK telecom T1 seal their victory. So, it seems fitting that today, it was a perfectly timed flash forward by Park that caught SKT’s star player, Lee “Faker” Sang-hyeok, that helped cemented Samsung Galaxy’s status as 2017’s World Champions.
For a full look at the World Championship Finals, check out our breakdown of all three games, below:
Game 1
Winner: Samsung Galaxy
This wasn’t a perfect game for Samsung Galaxy, but it might as well have been. SKT were held to just one tower and no kills as SSG completely dominated every phase of the game. Not only did SKT never have a chance back into this game, they were never even given a true teamfight that they could have gotten lucky with. This game was all about Samsung’s absolute control.
Game 2
Winner: Samsung Galaxy
One of the popular narratives coming into this series was the idea that SK telecom T1 were far superior to Samsung in terms of teamfighting. Based on this game, it seems that SKT may have thought so too, as they drafted a split pushing composition, but put themselves in position for teamfights instead. Unfortunately for SKT, this narrative is vastly overblown, and it turns out, SSG has one of the best teamfights in the world. So, with SKT giving away the opportunity for fights, Samsung took it promptly used the gold to take over the game once again.
Game 3
Winner: Samsung Galaxy
This is the game that proved just how incredible Samsung were played during this series. SKT got out to an early lead and by mid game it seemed that lead would be entirely insurmountable for Samsung, but things simply seemed meant to be for them during this series. Three expertly set up picks against SKT’s damage carries pulled Samsung back into the game and gave them the gold lead they needed to take down SKT’s Nexus and end their Korean rival’s unbeaten streak at Worlds.