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Samsung Galaxy Upset SKT at the 2017 League of Legends World Finals Odds

Written by on November 4, 2017

Once, could be luck. Two in a row could be the start of a trend, but three in a row generally means unabashed dominance. For the third straight year, the League of Legends World Championship featured a final matchup between two South Korean teams, Samsung Galaxy & SK Telecom T1, with the first one arriving in as the 2017 League of Legends World Finals Odds underdog (+145), but they were able to pull one of the biggest upsets in recent e-Sports Betting history.

Samsung Galaxy Upset SK Telecom at the League of Legends World Finals Odds

  • When: Saturday, November 4
  • Where: The Bird’s Nest, Beijing, China at the Beijing National Stadium
  • Opening League of Legends World Finals Odds: Samsung Galaxy +145 / SK Telecom 1 -175
  • Winner: Samsung Galaxy
  • MVP: Park “Ruler” Jae-hyuk

E-SPORTS – COUNTER-STRIKE: GO ODDS

Event History

  • First Season: 2011
  • Administrator: Riot Games
  • Format: Round-robin (group stage) / Single-elimination (bracket stage)
  • Teams: 24
  • Official Website: LOL eSports

Road to the Championship

The League Champions Korea region was dominant at Worlds with a 24-8 record in games against every other region, which is why Samsung Galaxy and SK Telecom T1 met in the first-ever repeat final at Beijing’s Birds Nest Stadium this Saturday. Just one year ago, the 2016 series spanned 4 hours and 12 minutes of game-time, longer than any other series at World Finals since 2015. It ended with an SKT victory, giving the team its second straight and third overall Summoner’s Cup. Still, even after winning after last year’s final, SKT made some changes by replacing Lee “Duke” Ho-Seong and Bae “Bengi” Seong-Ung with Heo “Huni” Seung-hoon and Han “Peanut” Wang-ho, while, despite their loss at the finals, Samsung Galaxy had no major roster changes, one of the reasons they pull the upset this year. Even though SKT made a pair of big roster changes, they still managed to bag both, the regular season and playoffs of the LCK Spring Split while splitting four games evenly against Samsung Galaxy in the process. SKT arrived as the League of Legends World Finals Odds favorite. However, despite all of their success, SKT struggled in the Summer Split and finished fourth overall. SKT went 0-4 against Samsung Galaxy but got a big measure of revenge by taking out their rivals 3-0 in a best-of-five series against Samsung in the Summer Playoffs.

One Last Battle

Samsung Galaxy starts the final with a forceful 7-0 in casualties and a great level of gameplay, including a huge difference in gold. The second round was a little bit different, SKT punched back and dominate most of the time, but at the end, Samsung Galaxy managed to overcome some difficulties to gain a 2-0 lead. They consumed the sweep (3-0) thanks to an error by Bang, which left the doors open for Samsung Galaxy to reached the SKT Nexus. One key factor was that Ruler managed to find the vital pick onto Faker to lead his team into a very sweet victory/revenge. His laning prowess in Game 1 and Featherstorm layered in Game 2, pavement the way to become the MVP. And let’s not forget that the series ended with a pick onto Faker initiated by Ruler.

Complete Samsung Galaxy Roster

  • Lee Seong-jin (CuVee)
  • Kang Chan-yong (Ambition)
  • Lee Min-ho (Crown)
  • Park Jae-hyuk (Ruler)
  • Jo Yong-in (CoreJJ)
  • Park Min-seung (Haru)
  • Lee Seung-ju (Stitch)
  • Kwon Ji-min (Wraith)

Final Thoughts

This year, neither of these teams resemble their prior iterations, despite sharing many of the same names on paper, but they gave us a remarkable performance at the finals. Since day one, Samsung Galaxy was my pick, including the huge upset at the finals, mostly because they lost last year’s championship but perform very well against the favored SKT1 in head-to-head play this year. Faker may be regarded as the world’s best player, but Samsung Galaxy’s victory proved no one is unbeatable in anything.