The final week of the League of Legends Pacific Championship Series (PCS) 2020 Summer Split Regular Season delivered both thrills and heartbreak across the three days of competition, including the nerve-wrecking tiebreaker on Sunday.
At the start of the week, plenty of excitement grew around the possibility of an unprecedented, four-way tie among the top four teams: Taipei J team (JT), ahq eSports club (AHQ), PSG Talon (PSG), and Machi Esports (MCX). The stars seem to align as all four teams secured the necessary wins over the weekend, though it all came down to the crucial match between JT and MCX.
Match of the Week: NOV vs HKA
A win for MCX against JT would have guaranteed the four-way tie, while JT could have ended the Regular Season in first place with a win against the runner-up of the League of Legends PCS Spring Split. Fully aware of the risk posed by the four-way tie, JT was relentless in this match. They were able to secure Cloud Soul under 24 minutes and decimated MCX despite Mission having his pocket pick Azir, ending the match with 0 kills and 6 deaths. The first-place finish of JT is a vast improvement for a team that barely made it into the playoffs in Spring. This performance was their greatest show of intent to qualify for Worlds 2020.
The tiebreaker match that both teams needed to win to avoid the Lower Bracket in playoffs was a back-and-forth affair.
Hong Kong Attitude (HKA) started brightly with three kills with no contest, while Nova Esports (NOV) focused on securing objectives. HKA failed to match NOV’s aggression during team fights and surrendered dragons in quick succession, including the Water Soul.
This provided NOV with the edge they needed during the Elder Drake fight, leaving HKA defenseless, eventually collapsing while defending their Nexus.
AHQ Kongyue was the Player of the Week.
Week 7 results
Both AHQ and PSG were the only teams remaining to address the tiebreaker in the League of Legends PCS Summer Split. Both teams ended their Regular Season with an impressive 14W4L record, the same tally that AHQ had in Spring with the improvement of an additional win for PSG. However, it was AHQ that came on top with aplomb on Sunday. PSG’s draft was far too reliant on mid-to-late game scaling. AHQ took the game to them as early as the third minute of the match, which ended in just under 30 minutes, effectively preventing PSG from playing out their strategy. AHQ secured second place, which granted them a round bye to start in Round 2 of the Upper Bracket alongside JT, while PSG and MCX moved to Round 1, finishing third and fourth.
Alpha Esports (ALF) headed to the final week of the Regular Season with a slim lead over HKA and NOV, but both ALF and HKA failed to muster a single win to claim the fifth spot. They allowed NOV to close the gap, triggering a three-way tie with a 7W11L record.
Thanks to ALF’s superior head-to-head record among the three teams, they were seeded higher. This meant NOV had to play HKA in the first of two tiebreaker matches in the gauntlet format. NOV was able to fend off HKA and send their opponent to the Lower Bracket. This is the second split in a row where HKA has ended up in Lower Bracket position at the start of the playoffs.
Final playoffs berth
NOV had no time to celebrate as they took on ALF next to fight for fifth place, booking a playoffs date with MCX. The losing team would go on to face PSG. ALF found themselves under pressure throughout the game but a massive positioning mistake by NOV allowed ALF Weilun’s Aphelios to wipe out their opponent with his ultimate to claim the victory.
At the bottom of the standings and vying for the final playoffs berth, Berjaya Dragons (BJD) and Liyab Esports (LYB) faced off on Friday. LYB needed a win here to keep their playoffs dream alive and they did emerge victorious. However, their final task was to best the 10th-place team, Resurgence (RSG) but they came up short in the Promotion/Relegation match. In fact, LYB will be joining RSG to defend their PCS 2021 spot against the winner of the PCS Promotion Qualifier later in September.
RSG managed to redeem themselves on the final day of Regular Season with two victories — one against LYB and the other an upset win against ALF. They played like a team with nothing to lose and ended their split the same way they started it — with a win, sandwiching 15 losses in between.
