The second semifinal of the 2022 LCS Lock-In tournament saw Evil Geniuses dominate Cloud9 in a 3-0 sweep to set up a finals matchup Sunday against Team Liquid.
In Game 1, Evil Geniuses used the potent Diana-Yasuo combo in a heavy team-fighting composition to great success, the first time the two champions have looked strong at the Lock-In. Star rookie mid laner Joseph “Jojopyun” Pyun excelled as Yasuo early, enabled by jungler Kacper “Inspired” Sloma’s Diana.
Inspired was a menace early, finding his team kills across the map and allowing the Geniuses to snowball their early gold lead.
By the time Cloud9’s carries were ready to fight, it was simply too late for Cloud9 to come back. The Geniuses took a pre-25 minute Baron and walked through Cloud9’s defenses, leading to a gold deficit of over 11,000 by the time the Geniuses took Game 1 in 26 minutes on blue.
Evil Geniuses carried their momentum into Game 2, where Cloud9’s questionable draft led to an early lead for the Geniuses. With Cloud9’s new mid laner, converted top laner Ibrahim “Fudge” Allami, playing Lux, a low-priority champion, Jojopyun was free to roam and exert his will as Viktor. With Evil Geniuses firing on all cylinders, there was little Cloud9 could do to stabilize after failing to get ahead early. The Geniuses took Game 2 in 29 minutes on red by simply pushing up the mid lane, forcing match point.
With their backs to the wall, Cloud9 opted to try out new strategies, namely putting top lane veteran Darshan “Darshan” Upadhyaya on Akshan in Game 3. Darshan got ahead early through lane domination, preventing the Geniuses’ stalwart top laner Jeong “Impact” Eon-young’s Gragas from doing anything and picking up a couple of early kills.
While Darshan was ahead, the rest of Cloud9 held firm against the Geniuses, leading to a gold lead at 12 minutes. Unfortunately for Cloud9, though, the Geniuses wouldn’t be denied, finding kills in the mid game to get Jojopyun’s Ryze fed. All it took was one lost teamfight for Cloud9 around 27 minutes into the match, and the Geniuses managed to take down Cloud9’s base, leading to a decisive 3-0 sweep with a final-game win in nearly 30 minutes on red.
The Lock-In tournament began with 10 teams divided into two groups by the Summer 2021 finalists: 100 Thieves and Team Liquid. The top four teams from each group advanced to an eight-team, single-elimination playoff bracket. The quarterfinals were best-of-three, while the semifinals and final are best-of-five.
The winning team will take the event’s entire $150,000 prize pool.
The Lock In Tournament finishes on Sunday with the Finals:
Evil Geniuses vs Team Liquid
LCS Lock-In 2022 results
1. TBD
2. TBD
3-4. Dignitas, Cloud9
5-8. 100 Thieves, FlyQuest, Golden Guardians, Counter Logic Gaming
9-10. TSM, Immortals
–Noah Waltzer, Field Level Media