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DEAN'S LIST WEEK 9 (BOL GOLD RECAP & PREVIEW)




Hello everybody and welcome to the ninth edition of BOL Gold’s Dean’s List! As this is the final week before playoffs, we’re gonna break down all of the matches in order from least to most impact on playoffs standings!





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Mystic Cats Gold (3-5) vs Nameless Rising (1-7)

Result: MCG 2-0


This match featured two teams that were out of playoff contention. Both teams were also playing with subs, so there really wasn’t much of anything on the line here. This recap will be much shorter as a result.


G1 was a complete stomp from the side of MCG. The only neutral objectives they lost was all six Grubs, which is admittedly a big deal. That said, they still ended up with Soul, Herald, and two Barons (not to mention a 7 tower lead) to end the game 26-3 with a 14.6k gold lead. Absolutely brutal.


The next game was significantly closer. The NR top laner and sub jungler had a very strong early start, securing 5 / 6 Grubs and getting both first blood and first tower. Both teams would go on to trade objectives as well as skirmish wins before MCG secured Baron at 25 minutes. They went on to win the game in 28 minutes, securing themselves a 2-0 victory.


While this series may not have had any major stakes, it was still a good win for this MCG roster, letting them end their season on a high note.


Player of the Series: Super Hoagie - Hoagie had two very good games on two very different supports (Naut g1, Milio g2). The highest combined KP in the series and solid enough vision control helps give them the nod.





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REV Eternal (5-3) vs Flannel Ethereal (0-8)

Result: Ethereal FF


Damn. Nothing else to say about it, really. Ethereal wasn’t able to field an eligible roster, so they were left with no other option but to forfeit.


Honestly, nobody here was happy about this situation. The REV guys wanted to earn their seed in a real match while the Ethereal guys just wanted to play.


In the end, we turned the match into an impromptu scrim. We played a mostly serious game (Rammus/Zilean goes insane) and at least had fun. Thanks for the game, Ethereal. Y’all are real for that.


Player of the Series: No - I’m not awarding a PotS for this, are you kidding me?





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Hyperion Esports (5-3) vs Flannel Zephyr (2-6)

Result: Hyperion 2-1


What the hell was this? Sure, Hyperion won and locked themselves into the 4th/5th match, but this was not the type of quality win you would expect from a 4th/5th place team against an already-eliminated Zephyr squad.


We’ll get this out of the way first, g1 was an absolute stomp. At no point did it ever really feel like Zephyr had a chance to win. Dione had arguably her best game of the split on Syndra, absolutely demolishing Akovi’s Neeko along with the rest of Zephyr. The game was a 33 minute win for Hyperion that gave the false impression that this series would be a relatively easy win for Hyperion.


Then Zephyr went “it’s Zephyring time” and Zephyred all over them.


In one of the most creative drafting moves I’ve seen all split, Zephyr picked Hwei on R3, which baited Hyperion into taking Akali on B5. The Flannel team then took Malphite on R5, which they flexed mid, dropping Hwei into the bottom lane. Zephyr’s comp was then Warwick top, Amumu jungle, Malphite mid, Hwei/Pyke bot. This was matched into HYP’s Ornn, Rek’Sai, Akali, Jinx, Braum.


Now, looking just at those champions, this should absolutely be the game where Jinx pops off and shreds all of the frontline. Akali can either build tank and play for the sustained fight (assassin class btw), or play to burst down the Hwei.


None of this happened.


Zephyr made the game messy very early on. Straight up, Null is a completely different dawg (ha) on Warwick. His map influence was the best we’ve seen from him all split, as he won several skirmishes in top and was even a major contributor in later teamfights. Hyperion would win some skirmishes of their own, but it wasn’t enough for them to keep the gold lead closer than 6k. Late in 3rd quarter of the game, Atilla’s Jinx finally came online with the LDR, allowing him to really be able to cut through some of the Zephyr meatballs. Both teams then traded teamfight wins and objectives until the Flannel squad found the winning formula in 48 minutes.


Series score, 1-1.


Going into g3, Zephyr again drafted a giga-frontline meatball comp, while Zephyr picked one of the most dive heavy comps possible (FNL.Z: Skarner, Amumu, Renekton, Hwei/Senna vs HYP: Malphite, Xin Zhao, Ahri, Jinx/Janna). Somebody was going to win this game, and it was going to be bloody.


Zephyr came out strong with almost the entire early game going their way. Despite Dione starting off 4/1 by 16 minutes, literally every other lane for HYP was losing. After 32 minutes of honest dominance, the Flannel squad had secured all six Grubs, Herald, and three Drakes. It would take a miracle for HYP to win.


Hyperion ended up finding that miracle at 35 minutes when Dione found a triple kill on the entire Zephyr topside, which then set up for a HYP Baron. The purple buff gave them the pening that they needed, allowing for both the final teamfight win and the push to the Nexus. The game ended in just over 40 minutes, with Hyperion taking the series 2-1.


What a disgusting win. By all accounts, this should have been a loss if Zephyr played their macro just a little bit better. Hyperion honestly looks like the weakest team remaining in the postseason. They just look like a shell of themselves, and one need only check #Gold-General to see why. Maybe they’ll bring it all together, but the clock is ticking on what might just be their final hour.


Player of the Series: Dione Atlas - Luckily, I have the benefit of the eye test for this one, and Atlas saved so much of g3 it’s unreal. The triple kill before Baron might honestly be the only reason that this team is in the 4th/5th match instead of the 3rd/6th. Pair that with her insane g1 performance, and you have a pretty clear-cut PotS.




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BDE Typhoon (7-1) vs BDE Corruption (5-3)

Result: Corruption 2-0


In arguably the most shocking upset of the season, Corruption managed to not only take down their sister team, but they did so in 2-0 fashion. Since the most interesting possible result from the most interesting match happened, let’s break it down to figure out how.


The first game saw Corruption hold onto a 3k gold lead for a majority of the 49 minute banger. Their lead came largely off the back of early objective control, particularly around the topside. Though some kills did start going Typhoon’s way in the mid game, Corruption’s Baron at 28 minutes slingshotted them significantly far ahead. The later stages of the game would grow close again, however, with BDE.T winning a 3-0 Baron teamfight, before a late-stage Elder buff helped Corruption push to end.


Worth mentioning is how Corruption somehow won g1 with a 2k gold deficit. I just think that’s funny.


In stark contrast to the g1 slow burn, g2 was a bit of a stomp. Legit nothing of note happened for the first almost 11 minutes until XIL killed Bean for First Tower. From that point on, XIL was simply unleashed in the top lane, going deathless for the rest of the game while rolling every fight he took part in. The only thing Typhoon managed to get was a Baron at 26 minutes, which was unfortunately traded for their Nexus. The game ended in just under 27 minutes, securing the victory for Corruption.


The most surprising thing about this series to me is how well prepared BDE.C was in draft. At this point, it shouldn’t be much of a surprise that the secret carry for Typhoon is Kidacus, particularly on the Miss Fortune. With that banned in both games, their late game teamfighting was just… less clutch? It’s hard to quantify, but it feels like there’s just something missing.


With this win, Corruption have earned the 4th seed in the regular season, meaning that they are set to face off against Hyperion Esports. Compare this team now to how they looked a few weeks ago and it is a completely different animal. They’ve suddenly become one of the absolute scariest teams left standing, which is honestly a very scary thought.


Player of the Series: XIL69 - XIL looked great against both of his lane opponents. Dealing 73.4k damage while tanking 79k in the series, 11/5/8 in g1 and a perfect 8/0/0 in g2 are enough for me to grant him his first top lane PotS.





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REV Regalia (7-1) vs Conduit Prime (5-3)

Result: Conduit 2-0


Okay, so, uh, I guess this week was upset week. Cool. Thanks for the memo, guys.


In all seriousness, this was a huge win for Conduit going into the postseason. While it also denies Regalia the first seed, it gives them a ton of momentum heading into their matchup against Eternal. While it is worth noting that Regalia was playing with a substitute bot lane, this shouldn’t take everything away from how Conduit looked in their wins.


Despite the gold being within 1k almost the entire time, g1 really felt like a comeback win for Conduit. Ball Slap came out with a huge lead early while Hoodie started the Drake stacking. Some kills were traded back and forth for several minutes until Conduit ended up securing Soul Point by 21 minutes. Regalia then found a 26 minute Baron to keep things close, but it was unfortunately not enough. Prime secured Soul at 26 and Elder at 33 minutes, which allowed them to get a Baron of their own to end the game in 36 minutes.


Surely after a game this close and exciting, the next one would be just as much so, right? Not even a little bit! G2 was a total stomp, with Prime starting their snowball early and accelerating it way past the point of control. Hoodie was a man possessed in this game, going 9/1/5 on his patented Briar. It was a 36 minute game that really just felt like a slow choking of Regalia. There’s nothing else to say, it was just some good, clean League from Conduit.


I’ll say this now, I think this series looks completely different if Regalia is playing with their full starting roster. No disrespect meant to Ballistic and Saiph, they aren’t bad players. Playing against a team at Conduit’s level without a season’s worth of built-up synergy is just hard.


With this result alongside the others, Conduit will be playing against Eternal in r1 of playoffs. They’re currently a sleeper favorite for a lot of people, and it’s hard to disagree with why. Since the formation of this new roster, they haven’t dropped a series, and they’ve taken down two of the teams above them. We’ll do a little more analysis in a little bit, so scroll down to check that out.


Player of the Series: Hoodie - For the record, it was so close to being Final, but Hoodie wins out due to higher series KP. A series KDA of 5.2, series KP of 67.5%, all while dealing a total of 32.6k damage (13.8 on Amumu, 18.8 on Briar) and soaking 68.1k (30.5 on Amumu, 37.6 on Briar) is more than good enough to earn PotS.


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With last week’s recap done, I wanna quickly go over some of the key matchups to watch for round 1 of playoffs! I’m choosing these based on how hype I expect them to be as well as how much narrative there is between the involved players.


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TOP: XIL vs Indigo


Top lane in the Corruption/Hyperion match should be super volatile. Both of these players have been non-factors in team wins while they’ve also both been the reason their team has won some games. It’s super hard to say who has the upper hand if you look at full season stats (XIL has been a top laner for about 3 weeks now), but comparing recent performances is where things get interesting.


XIL looks like the top performing top laner at this specific moment in time. He did great against Bean in the one game we saw between them, going deathless in that game while dealing an insane amount of damage. This needs to be tempered, however, as he had a very poor showing against D3adpixel in week 8.


Indigo should still be more than capable of hanging with XIL if we look at averages, but I expect this lane to go the way of the Corruption top laner. One thing’s for sure, though. This 1v1 will be anything but boring.


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JGL: TheDean0 vs HoodiemanX


I will be the first to admit that Hoodie is a much more consistent jungler than I am. If I am being perfectly honest, I do not think that I am better than Hoodie in an isolated 1v1. That’s the thing though, isn’t it. League isn’t an isolated 1v1, it’s a team game.


Conduit’s jungler is an exceptional Briar player. He’s posted too many games with some insane KDAs and damage numbers that can make a man blush. When taken away from his crazy goth wife, he tends to go towards more traditional jungle picks like Amumu, Poppy, and the odd Rammus. Meanwhile, if you look at my pool for this split, it consists of literally everything, so the consistency is hard as hell to judge.


If both of us end up on tank duty, then it turns into a battle of “who can snowball their strongside the hardest.” Should he end up on Briar, it turns into a game of “can Eternal shut down the not-vampire chick?” On the offhand chance that Dean0 is allowed to play a DPS champ, the question becomes “will he not int his team?”


Please don’t let this turn into Sejuani vs Amumu for 5 games.


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MID: Dione Atlas vs Pandorum


Dione vs Pando is so interesting on paper. On one hand, you have two super aggressive mid laners who want to push their opposite out of lane and take control of the early game tempo as quickly and as abrasively as possible. On the other hand, you have standard mid picks vs absolute psychopathy.


Atlas has more often than not been the reason her team has been able to win games. I can only think of two genuinely bad games from her off the top of my head (first time A.Sol, Akali), whereas I can think of multiple bad series from Pando. That being said, Pando also holds their specific head to head, which is worth quite a bit.


The biggest question to me is which version of these players shows up? Will Dione even be able to make an appearance at all? I’ll be perfectly honest, the odds of Hyperion winning without her are almost dead on arrival.


Should we get both of these players playing at their absolute best, then I’m expecting a back and forth slug fest filled with early tempo trades that comes down to teamfight execution. If not, then. Well. Well.


Well.


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BOT: VampiricNarwhal vs Atilla


There’s a reason Narwhal was ranked above Atilla on my player rankings last week. Hell, there’s a reason I ranked Atilla below the player who I’ve never seen play.


Neither of these two players are exceptionally strong laners (Narwhal better) and neither of these two players are exceptionally strong teamfighters (Narwhal better). They are both very much role players who should know what their role is on their team.


The difference between them is such: I’ve seen Narwhal win games where he’s been given resources. Corruption doesn't often play this way, but I have seen it. Meanwhile, I’ve seen Hyperion lose a game where Atilla had 17 kills.


The last time these two teams played, Narwhal had a season-best outing on his Nilah, which I have no expectations on appearing again. What I can truthfully say is this: if both ADCs are given the bare minimum of resources, I expect Narwhal to provide exponentially more than his opponent.


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SUP: BooterScooch vs HeliumBamboo


HabitedBaloo is a player that I am excited to see in action. After being hyped up on her Taric and enchanter gameplay, I just have genuine excitement to see her in action. Meanwhile, I fully subscribe to the BooterScooch bandwagon, as I believe she is the best support in the league.


Both of these players should be looking to play for lane dominance and teamfight defense, which their pools should be skewed towards. While they both have good teamfighting ADCs behind them (Billy and Valak is the HM for this week), these two need to do their best to set them up for success.


I’ll spoil something about Conduit vs Eternal, I genuinely think bot lane in general is critical to this series. Eternal needs to focus on snowballing Billy, while Conduit needs to focus on shutting him down. It all starts from somewhere, and I am genuinely so excited for this series. Good luck, Prime. You’ll need it.



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