I’m going to be honest, we all expected a bit of a  wash.  

Cloud9 was coming off one of the worst crashes in LCS history, going from historically dominant to historically slumped. After one of the best Spring Splits in LCS history, they got knocked out by TSM and lost their bid at Worlds.  

Evil Geniuses, on the other hand, told a different, more forgettable story last year, struggling into 5th place by the end of it all.  

Maybe they had something to prove. Impact definitely looked like he did.  

The analysts on the desk and the casters all made allusions to the fact that signing Impact was a piece of big news, but one that lost headlines to even bigger news. Which is no surprise to most, as it’s not often players of SwordArt’s and Perkz’s calibers make their way over to the LCS from such successful franchises.  

The goredrinker Renekton came out in force as the big crocodile and company rained on Cloud9’s debut in the Lock In tournament, defeating them in an over-40 minute game. Impact went 4/1/11 (15.0 KDA), harassing Zven and Perkz in every teamfight and giving his team time to clean up the mess he made.  

At first, the game was tight, but EG slowly began to pull away more and more as Impact looked to roam mid, putting pressure on Perkz’s Yone and forcing uncomfortable fights. They made sure to catch Perkz out multiple times, giving him a less-than-impressive LCS debut at 4/7/2 (0.86 KDA).

<div style="width: 100%; display: flex; justify-content: center; max-width: 100%">
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet"><p lang="und" dir="ltr">☄️<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/LIVEEVIL?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#LIVEEVIL</a> | <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/LCS?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#LCS</a> <a href="https://t.co/fCbBfiyj0t">pic.twitter.com/fCbBfiyj0t</a></p>&mdash; Evil Geniuses (@EvilGeniuses) <a href="https://twitter.com/EvilGeniuses/status/1350524769385345025?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 16, 2021</a></blockquote>
</div>

Then, EG picked up momentum, leading to an infernal soul and a baron.  

Another shining spot for EG was Deftly, who got off to the races late into the game with Kai’Sa’s R, putting a lot of pressure on any crowd-controlled opponents who had the misfortune of being locked down. Generally thought of as an unexciting pickup, Deftly finished at 9/2/7 (8.0 KDA), and made several huge plays near the end of the game to close it out.  

Cloud9 didn’t play poorly, either, but the top and mid gap was clear. Jiizuke had a great showing himself, spoiling Perkz’s NA debut and making Yone’s lane miserable with an aggressive Syndra that made plays all over the map with her E. 

This was a game of roster moves, dark horses, and a coming out party for Evil Geniuses that put the LCS on notice—this was not the forgettable team of last year. This was a team that put together the puzzle pieces, and they are going to get spooky.  

The player of the game was Impact, but Jiizuke and Deftly made strong cases of their own. That being said, it’ll be interesting going forward to see how EG will mesh as the season continues with new items, a new format and a remote setting.  


Going forward, Evil Geniuses will play Immortals on Saturday, and Cloud9 will look to bounce back against FlyQuest.



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EG Belong at the Top: A Strong Case For Title Contention

Matt Thibault

@thibaultnottebo

9:47PM on Jan 16, 2021

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