League of Legends LEC power rankings Week 5 – a weekend of firsts

5. Splyce (6-4)

The worst of the two 6-4 teams in our LEC power rankings after Week 5, Splyce is one of the most talented teams in the LEC. Their bot lane of Kobbe and Norskeren is probably the second-best in the LEC behind that of G2, Marek “Humanoid” Brázda has been a top-three mid laner in his rookie year, and Xerxe has been a strong jungler. Even their “weak link” – top laner Tamás “Vizicsacsi” Kiss – hasn’t been terrible on the year.

Unfortunately, their loss to Fnatic on Friday is a big reason for their low ranking. The game was fairly close throughout, but Splyce fell because of their lack of coordination which resulted in members (normally Vizicsacsi and Humanoid) getting caught out allowing Fnatic to get easy objectives. This team has the talent to be dangerous if they can just stop making such silly mistakes.

4. Origen (6-4)

Remember when Origen was 2-4 after Week 3, looking like a team that would be firmly at the bottom of the table, with games against FC Schalke and G2 coming? If you had said Origen would go unbeaten over the next four games, including beating the best two teams in the LEC (sorry for the spoiler), most League of Legends fans would have thought you to be crazy.

Origen has a ton of feel-good stories and amazing performances from their players. Mid laner Nukeduck has established himself as the second-best mid in Europe, behind only G2’s Caps, and popped off against “Baby Faker” on Zed in Origen’s win against the kings of Europe.

Support Mithy has had a resurgence of his play after a down year in NA, and is currently the third-best support in the LEC. He’s buoyed by his young bot lane partner Patrik, who has been a pleasant surprise when it comes to ADCs in Europe. Origen may not be a flashy team, but they have beaten the kings of Europe, so other LEC teams are sure to respect them.

3. Vitality (7-3)

A very odd weekend for Vitality, as they dropped a surprising game to SK Gaming before beating FC Schalke on Day 2 of play. While most Vitality fans were assuming that the “Italian Stallion” Daniele “Jiizuke” di Mauro would lead the team this year, their mid laner has been exceptionally average.

Instead, they’ve been lead by their top-side of the map, with jungler Lee “Mowgli” Jae-ha and top Lucas “Cabochard ” Simon-Meslet both being ranked in the top three at their positions. This was the case this past weekend; Cabo was the only one who performed well against SK, going 7/1/1 on Urgot, while Mowgli had a disastrously bad day on Jarvan going 0/5/3. On Saturday, however, the two combined for a score of 4/2/17, with Mowgli able to help get Jiizuke rolling on Vlad.

2. FC Schalke 04 (7-3)

It might seem odd to rank Schalke ahead of Vitality given that last weekend Vitality got the better of their head to head matchup. Admittedly, it is quite close but Schalke gets the slightest of edges for two reasons.

The first is that Schalke did manage to beat Vitality earlier on in the split, and given that the two teams traded losses between Origen and SK (Vitality beat Origen, a harder team, while Schalke did not, and vice versa) Schalke comes out with a slightly better “win quality than Vitality. Second, Schalke has two stellar players boosting their overall talent quotient: Odoamne is rated the best top in LEC and Upset is the second-best ADC in the league. Make no mistake, though, the difference between Schalke and Vitality is razor thin.

1. G2 (9-1)

You know what’s not razor thin, though? The margin between G2 and all the other teams in these LEC power rankings.

Despite suffering their first loss of the season, the gap between G2 and Schalke is still wider than the gap between Schalke and Splyce. The team is still the best in the LEC in every major statistical category (they’re both the best early and mid/late game team) and every individual player is ranked the best or second-best at his position. Origen may have shown that G2 isn’t immortal, but they’re still the team to beat.

What was your favorite moment from last week’s European League of Legends action? Let us know in the comments, and tell us how you would change our LEC power rankings for Week 5!