RheingoldRiver brings match reports and interviews from the LCS floor

With excellent overviews of each match and interviews with the expert summoners involved, RheingoldRiver brings fantastic insight into the NA Spring Playoffs that enthralled millions as part of the League of Legends Championship Series event this past weekend.

RheingoldRiver is a valued member of the terrific LolKing community; the site for all of your League of Legends tools, guides and information. You can also find additional, regular LoL insights at Rhein’s own blog, right here.

The first set of day 2 of the LCS Spring Playoffs was between Vulcun and TSM after Vulcun had upset CLG the day before.  The theme of the day would be dominance by whichever team was able to first-pick Sona.

Match Report 1

In the first game, TSM picked five champions that they were very comfortable with, TheOddOne returning to Maokai, Rumble and Karthus for the solo lanes, and Caitlyn-Sona bot.  WildTurtle secured first blood for his team onto Xmithie's Jarvan IV when the Vulcun jungler overstayed in botlane to help out Sycho Sid's 1v2 lane.  A one-for-one trade in top lane burned mancloud's teleport on Katarina, and TSM took the first dragon at about 16 minutes and then grouped to push mid.  A great Unstoppable Force by Sycho Sid led to a kill on WildTurtle, but Vulcun ultimately chased TSM all the way across the map and Dyrus was able to turn the fight around.  The next fight was solidly in TSM's favor, and they were able to pick up baron and then the win at 30 minutes.

Game 2 was absolutely dominated by mancloud's Jayce.  With the first two blue buffs for himself, and Reginald getting his 7-minute blue stolen by Xmithie, mancloud won mid lane so hard that he was able to kill Karthus 1v1, Vulcun going 3-0 across the map at 10 minutes.  With more pickoffs and strong double-split pushing, Vulcun took a huge lead, winning a teamfight 5-2 at 30 minutes with a quadra kill for mancloud.  TSM picked up Baron a few minutes later, but it was at the cost of a nexus turret to super minions, and Vulcun ended up winning the game, pushing the series to three games.

In game 3, Vulcun tried again to show their blue buff control of the previous game, but they were unable to, the smiting of TheOddOne on Cho'gath proving too strong.  At 4 minutes, Vulcun took first blood in toplane, but it was at the cost of their bot outer turret.  Fantastic Sona play from Xpecial won TSM a fight at 20 minutes, TSM now up about 8k gold from dragons, three towers, and five kills.  Five minutes later, mancloud again showed why his Jayce is to be feared, as he flashed to block an Ace in the Hole from killing Bloodwater and almost immediately after picked off Reginald's Diana with an E-Q combo.  However, TSM were able to win a few more skirmishes and secured Baron at 28 minutes.  Sacrificing two to get mid inhibitor turret, TSM were able to close out the game at 35 minutes, moving on to the finals.

Match Interview 1

I wasn't able to interview any members of TSM, but I did get to speak with mancloud after his fantastic showing on Jayce in game 2.

Rhein: Unfortunately a more disappointing finish than yesterday, but overall you did qualify for the summer split of the LCS.  So as a team, how are you feeling right now?

mancloud: It was a disappointing loss, but I don't think many people on my team care, because we're back in the LCS and that's just the biggest factor.

When Tristana was banned, that was Zuna's go-to ADC.  So did you decide that you were going to change a lot of strategy around that, or you were going to play the same way, just with a different ADC?

We were expecting the Tristana ban.  He was 10-0 with it I think in the past games, and we know TSM isn't stupid, so they're just going to ban Tristana.  So we were planning on playing either Kog'maw or Varus or MF.  So we were just planning on three other champions.

In the second game, which you did win, you had really good blue buff control at the beginning of the game.  How much did that contribute to your victory?

Getting blue buff control not only helps mid push to turret and then roam, it helps you make plays, because you know when it's coming, people are going to be around that part of the map.  And that helps you make plays and direct the flow of the game, and that's really huge.

Rhein: Can you discuss your mobility boots on Jayce?

I love mobi boots on Jayce just because you can be everywhere on the map with acceleration gate, and you don't really want to be in combat with anyone, you just want to poke, so it gives you the perfect positioning to poke.

Speaking of poke, what's your secret to those amazing E-Q combos?

I always see people do Q, and then they throw the gate out as the Q is flying through the air, but if you just gate in front of you and Q, it's much faster and harder to react to.

Always first-picked, how important was Sona in that series?

I think Sona was a huge impact in the series.  We really wanted it in the third game, and I feel like that was one of the biggest impacts on why we lost, but they had first pick, and we didn't feel like banning it, so we kind of kicked ourselves there.

Do you have any plans for the summer split?

We'll just practice, come up with some new strategies.  There's probably going to be another champion, plus Zac, so we have new champions to incorporate into the strategies; that's about it.

Any shoutouts?

Shoutout to Ali and Murdi, our sponsors, PWR Clothing, NOS, all of our fans, and you can follow me at vulcun_mancloud on twitter.