BLG won Game 1 to strike first in the series. It was a match that highlighted once again the critical importance of early laning priority.
On November 9 KST, the 2026 LoL World Championship (Worlds) semifinals match between T1 and BLG took place at the Credit Union of Texas Event Center in Allen, Texas. In Game 1, BLG claimed victory by seamlessly rolling their snowball based on mid and bot priority.
Early in Game 1, T1 moved busily to turn things around after conceding laning priority in both mid and bot. They picked off Park 'Viper' Do-hyeon's Corki with a four-man bot dive and created an environment through a lane swap for Kim 'Peyz' Su-hwan's Xayah to scale as much as possible. Conversely, BLG steadily nurtured 'Knight''s Orianna while snowballing the game by taking both dragons and Void Grubs.
BLG cleanly took down Choi 'Doran' Hyeon-joon's Rumble through a top dive. After catching ON's Nautilus, T1 sought to take the Rift Herald as their prize, but BLG responded brilliantly. Xun's Naafiri stole the Herald, and in the following teamfight, collaborated with 'Knight''s Orianna to instantly burst down both Xayah and Lee 'Faker' Sang-hyeok's Locke.
BLG came out ahead at the dragon pit as well, with Xun succeeding in another Smite steal. Around the 20-minute mark, BLG picked off Mun 'Oner' Hyeon-jun's Nocturne to claim Baron, then caught T1 from behind as they tried an awkward defense, finishing off Rumble as well. Armed with the Baron buff, BLG applied simultaneous pressure in mid and bot, destroying the inhibitors. T1 engaged a fight as if refusing to let them walk away easily, but it resulted in a mere 2-for-4 trade.
To T1, Bin's K'Sante stood like an insurmountable mountain. They could hardly breach the front line, while the well-farmed Orianna ran rampant. Drawing T1 out with Baron, BLG swept up kills unilaterally. Left as the sole survivor, Locke was powerless to respond. Marching straight into the enemy base, BLG brought Game 1 to an end.
