Today, in Team SoloMid’s final game of the summer 2016 split (and the 2016 regular season as a whole), star ADC Yiliang "Doublelift" Peng made history as he notched his 1000th enemy kill in the regular season.
The epic moment came in game three of a series against NRG Esports. The series was tied one to one, but 28 minutes in, TSM had a huge lead and was invading NRG’s base, looking to close things out. As Caitlyn, Doublelift took out GBM’s Karma for his 999th kill. Moments later, Santorin’s Olaf was slain by Doublelift’s teammate, Hauntzer. Hauntzer would deny Doublelift the big number 1,000 again by (maybe accidentally?) killing off Quas’ Jax.
As the two towers protecting NRG’s nexus fell, Ohq (playing as Ashe), hid in the fountain, preventing an easy kill. Rather than going directly for the nexus, TSM made the call as a team to help award Doublelift his thousandth kill. They made a daring dive into the fountain, with Hauntzer giving up his life for his teammate to secure kill number 1,000.
Moments later, as airhorns sounded in the LCS arena, TSM destroyed NRG’s nexus, locking in a 17-win, one-loss summer season for the team. You can witness the final minutes of this game and the big moment for yourself in the video above (via JK Highlight).
Following the game, Doublelift was interviewed about his accomplishment.
"It feels really good," Doublelift said, "especially since I got it in the last game, game three, the very last kill right before we killed the nexus. My team set me up."
Doublelift says he was actually skeptical about fountain diving for the kill, scared of the team unintentionally throwing away a game they had in the bag. His team urged him on though.
"Being a pro just totally changed my life," said Doublelift, looking back on his career so far as a whole. "Five or six years ago, when I just started playing this game, I was definitely, like, I was a totally different person. Being a pro has been a way for me to get to know myself a lot better, and yeah, like my personality and my strengths and weaknesses as a person and my self-development has all been because of LCS and being a pro. It’s kind of like because of that that I’m so dedicated to maintaining a high level of play throughout my whole career. That’s my biggest pride, too. When I wake up in the morning, I’m like, ‘Dude, I’m so sick. I’m still pretty sick.’ A lot of players who are this old or who have been around so long, they’re not so good."
Doublelift went on to confidently say that TSM will win Worlds. You can watch the full interview below (also via JK Highlight).
Congrats to Doublelift and TSM on the milestone, and good luck with that Worlds goal!