The Moment: MSI 2017 Group Stage Day 2 Highlight

May 11, 2017

◈ SK Telecom T1 vs Team Solo Mid - Would you like some Peanut?

Sometimes, the outcome of a match is decided by a small factor. What decided the fate between SKT T1 and TSM, and the fate between Wangho "Peanut" Han and Dennis "Svenskeren" Johnsen's jungle fight was decided by each team's response time.

Peanut made the first move by taking the blue buff in TSM's jungle. Svenskeren logically responded by taking SKT's blue buff. Typically, the game would've gone on after trading camps, but Peanut decides to go back to his own camp.

Svenskeren did made a conscious decision of watching out for SKT by placing a ward before taking the blue buff. However, Sven's decisive mistake was starting a fight with Peanut. With level advantage, Svenskeren might have thought that he had better chance of winning. However, as the minion wave on top and mid lane was in SKT's favor, SKT's response was inevitably faster.

◈ Gigabyte Marines vs Flash Wolves - You are not the Iron Man, Stark

GAM's early game had been stellar. With over 10k gold advantage, it looked like GAM had the game in the bag. Unfortunately, their pride was their downfall. After a few failed tower dives, GAM lost their lead in the game. Especially, GAM's Stark had been doing well with Galio, but he shouldn't have positioned too deep behind the enemy line in the late game.

In contrast, FW kept their focus throughout the game. FW's strength lies in their outstanding teamfights. Usually, teams start to overextend or get caught off-position when they are losing - It wasn't the case for FW in the match. Except for a few small mistakes, FW played their teamfights much better than GAM through the match.

◈ G2 Esports vs Team WE - No, Kog'Maw! No!

◈ Flash Wolves vs Team SoloMid - It always happens.

TSM started this teamfight in a better position than FW by TSM trying to surrounding FW. However, TSM soon found themselves surrounded instead when FW fought back. With Hauntzer's Flash on cooldown, TSM shouldn't have attempted to have a teamfight in the first place. With Hauntzer off-positioned, TSM had to fight without Hauntzer, and they had to fall back without a chance for a counterattack. By the time Hauntzer joined his team, he had no choice but to fall back together.

FW managed to recover from their two losses in Day 1 and is now sitting at a 2-2 record by winning the match against TSM. If FW do well in the rest of the matches, they will have a good chance of advancing to semifinals. On the other hand, TSM lost both matches today, and their chance of going beyond the group stage looks grim. They will have to do much better than today if they want to advance to semifinals.

◈ Gigabyte Marines vs G2 Esports - Yes, Kog'Maw! Yes!

◈ Team WE vs SK Telecom T1 - "Hey... when can I fight?"

For SKT T1, this match was the most difficult match so far in MSI 2017. WE's Mystic-Ben duo overwhelmed Bang-Wolf duo during the laning phase, giving WE a head start. Not only that, WE's macromanagement was up to far with that of SKT T1. Although uneasy, WE had the lead against SKT T1 until the mid game. WE's best chance of defeating SKT T1 disappeared with a single mistimed Baron call.

To be fair, WE made an understandable call as they could see some of SKT T1's champion being around the bot lane area. However, the situation changed when SKT T1 collapsed on WE faster than they expected around the Baron area. With Baron down to 2000 Health, the teams were in uneasy tension over the Baron - and it was Peanut that ended this standoff by Flashing into the Baron spawn and winning the smite contest.

Peanut showed mediocre performance with Ivern until that point, but the Baron steal single-handedly turned the match around in favor of SKT. With the Baron buff and Huni's Kennen leading the split push, SKT was able to take back the initiative and end the game without giving WE a second chance.