Evil Geniuses took some time to get going in the 2020 League of Legends Championship Series Spring Split, but the team made sure that wasn't the case come summer. EG started out the Summer Split with a 2-0 week, triumphing over 100 Thieves before demolishing Counter Logic Gaming in a perfect game. 

Evil Geniuses Support Tristan "Zeyzal" Stidham spoke to Inven Global's Nick Geracie after the win about the perfect game victory, the current meta for Supports, and how Heo "Huni" Seung-hoon and Matthew "Deftly" Chen have impacted EG's LCS roster. 

Zeyzal, there are  a lot of ways today could have started, but the last thing I expected was a perfect game. Did you expect to beat CLG so convincingly?

We've really come together as a team in the past few weeks of scrims. We've learned a lot about how we want to play as well as how we play around one another, so as a team we've been doing really well. We've actually been practicing a really disciplined style of play and we've been translating it pretty well.

I'm not saying we expected to smash anyone in particular, but we expected to play a game where we try to minimize mistakes while still trying to keep up our aggression. I think we did that pretty well today. I'd say that in no way we expected a perfect game, but we do have a lot more games like this now that we've been practicing with more discipline in our scrims.

It's fair to say that you came into the matchup favored against CLG, but there have been rumblings that CLG's scrims have been going pretty well lately. Do you think this was an off game for them, or should we expect the same CLG from spring more or less?

It's hard for me to know, personally. We just played each other in week 1, but we haven't scrimmed them a single time. I think there are actually a lot of teams that were doing surprisingly well in scrims but sometimes teams just struggle to translate it to performance in games.

You certainly didn't struggle today. Lulu isn't exactly a pick I'd associate you with, but you excelled on the champion. What are your thoughts on the current meta for Supports?

It's mostly about matchups in bot lane. There are certain picks that are really strong, and so there are a certain set of bands that demand a response. I don't want to give away the exact draft strategy, but there are a few certain OP AD Carry champions that would normally get banned: Varus and Kalista. These AD Carries do really well with melee kill-focused support champions, but when you take those two champions out of the game it basically opens up the whole bot lane pool.

This factor is something that is really nice; you don't really see it in solo queue because usually those two AD Carries aren't banned. However, when both Varus and Kalista are banned, you can play pretty much anything you want in the bot lane. I think that's pretty refreshing.

That factor is especially good for EG since your players have shown more versatility than others in terms of champion pool. Has the team's style changed since adding Huni and Deftly to the LCS roster?

We haven't actually actively swapped any members of our roster. It's more that both Deftly and Huni are active in our conversations as a team and help direct our team in the way we want. Both players can offer a lot in terms of knowledge in the Draft Phase as well as general game knowledge. I think this is true especially with Huni. Huni sees the game in a different way and it gives us a unique perspective, especially in playing around Kumo.

This identifies a flaw we had previously as a team. We often wouldn't give Kumo the resources we needed to succeed, but now, we've opened that door. Initially, all we did was a tryout with a 7-man rotating roster and seeing what we liked. There was takeaways from what we liked with both rosters, and I think we've found a way to help integrate the changes to make us a stronger team overall.

If your most recent LCS game is any indication, I would be inclined to agree. Thanks for the interview, Zeyzal. Is there anything you want to say to the EG fans after a 2-0 week 1?

I'm happy that we could have a good opening week. It's definitely refreshing when compared to last split, and I hope that all of the fans support us throughout the rest of the season as well.

Looking for more LoL Esports interviews? Look no further.