Team SoloMid win the NA LCS Spring Split Championship beating Cloud9 in a back and forth series that came down to the fifth game. With this win Team SoloMid qualify for Riot’s Mid-Season Invitational for the first time since their fifth place finish there in 2015. TSM will also gain 90 Championship Points which will help them qualify for Worlds. Meanwhile, Cloud9 will take home 70 Championship Points for finishing second in the NA LCS Spring Split.

Team SoloMid won the first two games decisively with two of the fastest games in any NA LCS Finals. After struggling in games three and four Team SoloMid battled through a close game five that was dead even down to its last moment as the two teams both committed to pushing their opponents base to try for the win. This marks the second Championship for Team SoloMid and their fifth overall.

For Cloud9, they battled back from two huge losses in the first two games and managed some of their strongest play of the split in games three and four. While they started game five well, a few errant teamfights lost them their briefly held lead, though they were within a thousand gold of Team SoloMid through most of the game. This is Cloud9’s second runner up finish in the LCS in a row.

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7:48 pm ET — Both teams commit to major fights as C9 lose two members around Elder Dragon. This leads the remaining members of both teams to push their opponents bases. TSM manage to defend their base as they simultaneously push into C9’s and destroy their Nexus taking the NA LCS Spring Split Finals!

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7:44 pm ET — Cloud9 take a huge fight midlane and grab 4 kills for 2, and grab baron. Momentum may be on their side, the crowd certainly is.

The Cloud9 chant that just happened is the largest of the tournament so far.

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7:40 pm ET — Both teams playing far safer now that kills are a little more dangerous.

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7:27 pm ET — Cloud9 are starting to use their gold lead as they force advantages across the map, however, TSM are fighting back and grabbing 2 towers in a row bringing the gold difference to less than 1k.

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7:22 pm ET — A fight that spans every lane leads to a 3-2 trade and regaining a slight gold lead.

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7:12 pm ET — C9 up about 500 gold and 1 kill after a great tower dive on Bjergsen for Ray.

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7:08 pm ET — C9 grab first blood thanks to effective use of Kled’s turret de-aggro passive, giving them their earliest lead of the series.

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7:07 pm ET — Pick and Ban Game 5

TSM are going to be looking for picks once again, while Cloud9 are going to hope that their Kled engages can force some successful teamfights.

C9: Kled, Kha’Zix, Ekko, Lucian, Lulu

Bans: Rumble, Ashe, Ivern, Karma, Caitlyn

TSM: Camille, Lee Sin, Syndra, Varus, Nami

Bans: Leblanc, Graves, Rengar, Fizz, Shen

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6:56 pm ET — TSM chants from all over the arena, even the person behind me in a C9 jersey is getting in on it.

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6:41 pm ET — TSM start a 5v5 teamfight top — for indiscernible reasons — and it is quickly turned into an ace for C9 as they win the game and even the series.

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6:35 pm ET — Cloud9 take Baron and while TSM have a strong engage, their damage is way too low to take more than one kill or any towers, losing 2 more in a counter engage.

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6:33 pm ET — Cloud9 take a couple successful skirmishes taking their kill advantage to 6-0 and their tower advantage to 3-2.

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6:23 pm ET — C9 grabs 2 more kills as well as first tower to go up 3k at 14 minutes.

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6:19 pm ET — C9 grab first blood as the Gragas support pick for Smoothie pays off. They quickly follow up with a Bjergsen kill in the midlane.

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6:10 pm ET — Pick and Ban Game 4

Cloud9 is once again going with a devastating pick comp with both Ashe arrows and Syndra stuns. Meanwhile, TSM are going to be focusing on Lucian for their damage, which could be hard with the position disrupting Gragas ultimate.

TSM: Nautilus, Ivern, Orianna, Lucian, Lulu

Bans: Leblanc, Fizz, Rengar, Karma, Nami

C9: Shen, Graves, Syndra, Ashe, Gragas

Bans: Rumble, Kennen, Camille, Caitlym, Kog’Maw

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5:47 pm ET — A disastrous Baron call from TSM leads to a near ace and let’s Cloud9 push into the base and take a game back. The C9 fans clearly haven’t given up as their win gets the loudest cheer of the night so far.

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5:44 pm ET — TSM take a insanely aggressive fight inside the C9 buff at the tail end of their Elder Dragon, Baron buff window, but come out on the losing end of a 3-2 trade in kills.

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5:40 pm ET — The crowd is feeling the TSM win as the chants start low and grow louder and louder as TSM take their first C9 inhibitor.

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5:38 pm ET — TSM manage to pull back some of C9’s gold lead as they get a few catches opening a window for a quick Baron play.

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5:33 pm ET — C9 take an inhibitor and almost a Nexus tower before TSM counter engage and manage to pick up a 2-0 trade.

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5:30 pm ET — C9 are effectively growing their lead reaching an almost 3k gold lead at 30 minutes.

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5:20 pm ET — 20 minutes into the game and C9 have their first (almost) meaningful gold lead of the series thanks to a 6-5 lead in kills and an even 2-2 in towers.

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5:11 pm ET — C9 are able to answer a TSM dive bot and continue the trend of matching them punch for punch this game.

C9 managing to keep their heads up and in the series after the first two games is incredibly impressive and means they could still have a chance to pull some games back in this series.

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5:07 pm ET — This is TSM’s slowest early game but it didn’t stop them from getting first blood. But for the first time in the series, Cloud9 is close to even around 10 minutes with the kill score tied at 2-2.

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5:01 pm ET — “Let’s go Cloud9” chants moving through the audience slowly growing in the arena giving C9 a few more smiles than they had walking onto the stage.

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4:58 pm ET — Pick and Ban Game 3

TSM have a fantastic pick comp that will be incredibly dangerous for any non-grouped situation. Cloud9 will be looking for picks and some small skirmishes, which may help keep them focused going into the midgame.

C9: Fizz, Kha’Zix, Syndra, Ezreal, Lulu

Bans: Rumble, Ashe, Ivern, Caitlyn, Shen

TSM: Camille, Lee Sin, Ahri, Varus, Karma

Bans: Graves, Leblanc, Rengar, Lucian, Kennen

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4:34 pm ET — Well that wasn’t super close. TSM move within one game of another NA championship.

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4:30 pm ET — C9 are able to pull a few kills out, but it won’t make a difference. TSM still have an 18-4 kill lead and an 11k gold lead at 19 minutes.

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4:22 pm ET — The fighting in this game has been constant. 11 minutes in and C9 have over-extended at least 3 times giving TSM a huge advantage of almost 5k gold. C9’s body language starting to look visably frustrated by the way this game is going.

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4:11 pm ET — Pick and Ban Game 2

Both teams are going for pick compositions here. TSM are going to look to grab picks and burst them quickly with the Syndra, Rengar, Lucian combo. Meanwhile, C9 are going to aim for picks with Ashe arrows and Nautilus hooks.

TSM: Gragas, Rengar, Syndra, Lucian, Lulu

Bans: Leblanc, Fizz, Shen, Karma, Nami

C9: Nautilus, Graves, Ekko, Ashe, Zyra

Bans: Kennen, Rumble, Camille, Renekton, Varus

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3:48 pm ET — TSM prove the strength of the protect the Caitlyn comp as well as Hauntzer’s skills on Camille with an easy win in game 1.

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3:45 pm ET — TSM grab Baron at 24 minutes and Hauntzer gets a second solo kill on Ray bringing the TSM toplaner to 7/0/1. TSM’s gold lead is up to 11k with a 5-0 lead in turrets.

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3:39 pm ET — 20 minutes into the game and TSM is dominating C9. 8-1 in kills, 5-0 in towers and an almost 8k gold lead. Things are not looking good for C9.

I had to retype that three times because of how fast towers are falling.

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3:29 pm ET — 3 skirmishes and TSM are up 3-0 in kills as well as grabbing the infernal drake, all before 10 minutes.

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3:24 pm ET — C9’s difficult botlane gets even harder as Wildturtle grabs first blood off a botched invade by Contractz.

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3:19 pm ET — Pick and Ban Game 1

As expected, TSM is going with a protect the AD Carry comp using replacing the Kog’Maw (a champ Turtle has never played) with Caitlyn while Camille should be running interference in the Clou9 backline. C9 are going to be all about their skirmishes with Lucian and Kennen going for high burst.

C9: Kennen, Lee Sin, Cassiopeae, Lucian, Lulu

Bans: Rengar, Ashe, Rumble, Renekton, Orianna

TSM: Camille, Ivern, Taliyah, Caitlyn, Karma

Bans: Graves, Leblanc, Shen, Varus, Syndra

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The NA LCS Spring Split Playoffs come to a close on Sunday as Team SoloMid and Cloud9 — the league’s number one and number two seed respectively — will play each other in the finals. This will be the seventh time the two teams have met in the NA LCS Playoffs and the sixth in the Finals.

The match will have strong Worlds qualification implications for both teams, with the winner receiving 90 Championship Points, and the loser receiving 70 points. Alongside helping them qualify for Worlds the winner of the match will also receive an invitation to Riot’s Mid-Season Invitational tournament which will be held in Brazil this year.

For all the information about the possible matchups as well as the schedule, bracket and results from all of the NA LCS Playoffs check out our post here.

Team SoloMid had the most consistent Spring Split of any team in the LCS, only suffering three losses throughout the regular season — though one was to Cloud9. The team is, in all sense, a juggernaut. The one potential Achilles heel for TSM comes in AD Carry Jason “WildTurtle” Tran who has never played a professional game on Kog’Maw — one of the meta’s most popular picks at the moment.

For Cloud9 this split couldn’t have started better. They went undefeated for the first four weeks of the split before losing four of their next seven matches. This brief losing period seems to have strengthed Cloud9, however, and experienced significant improvement helping them come into Playoffs looking as strong as they have all season. If they are going to beat TSM it is likely going to come down to how effectively rookie jungler Juan “Contractz” Garcia can manage the series and dictate the pace of each game through ganks.

Lineups

Team SoloMid

• Kevin “Hauntzer” Yarnell
• Dennis “Svenskeren” Johnson
• Søren “Bjergsen” Bjerg
• Jason “Wildturtle” Tran
• Vincent “Biofrost” Wang

Cloud9

• Jeong “Impact” Eonyoung
• Juan “Contractz” Garcia
• Nicolaj “Jensen” Jensen
• Zachary “Sneaky” Scuderi
• Andy “Smoothie” Ta

Series info and how to watch

You can watch the best-of-five series live on Lolesports as well as on the NALCS1 Twitch channel.