League of Legends LEC power rankings week 1
8. Schalke 04 (1/1)
Despite reaching the playoff final of EU LCS Summer 2018, Schalke 04 failed to reach playoffs in 2019 LEC Spring. The German org will undoubtedly want to improve on their 7th place finish in the first half of the season, but they’ll need to do better than their showing last weekend if they’re to qualify for the playoffs in the Summer Split.
Victory against Excel Esports should be expected, but Schalke made hard work of it, and even looked set to lose the game if not for XL Hjarnan’s mispositioning that handed Schalke the win.
Day two saw a rematch of the Spring Split regular season tiebreaker that locked Schalke out of playoff contention, and the same result was inflicted upon them this time around as SK Gaming secured their 3rd victory over S04 in 2019 so far. It was another match-up that could have gone either way, but Schalke were in full control of the game at 20 minutes and will be disappointed that they couldn’t see it out.
Overall it was a decent start to the split for Schalke 04, but they’ll no doubt want to improve on their performances going into week two. Impressive displays from day one “Player of the Game” winner Gang-yun “Trick” Kim and star AD Carry Elias “Upset” Lipp will encourage the team heading into the regular season.
7. Rogue (1/1)
Yes. Rogue. In 7th. Although they may have ended the Spring Split in dead last with only 2 wins after one of the worst regular season performances Europe has ever seen, Rogue seem to have fixed their problems and look set to have a far more successful Summer Split.
What’s their secret? Roster changes.
Exciting prospect Emil “Larssen” Larsson finally joined up with the team after graduating from school during the mid-season break, as well as rookie jungler Kacper “Inspired” Słoma and both made promising starts to their LEC careers in week one.
Despite suffering a loss when facing Misfits Gaming, the Rogue mid lane 2v2 impressed and took a lead into the mid game. In fact, the combination of rookies Larssen and Inspired completely shut down two time EU LCS champion MSF Febiven and almost carried Rogue to victory.
Nevertheless, the team still has a lot to work on. Even in their win against Excel Esports, it was clear that Rogue aren’t a top team yet, as it took almost 40 minutes to end the game after establishing a gold lead early on. However, Rogue fans have a lot to look forward to as this new, five-man roster has performed better in two games than the previous line-up did in eighteen.
6. SK Gaming (1/1)
SK Gaming’s inexperienced roster surprised everyone by clinching playoff qualification in their first split in Spring, but what can they achieve with over 20 games of LEC action under their belt? Well, there isn’t really much we can gather from their first two games of Summer as they were cleanly dismantled by a remarkable Fnatic side, then took down Schalke 04 in a very close battle.
In their loss to Fnatic, SK were criticised for their lack of proactivity when behind and they simply allowed Fnatic to close the game out without taking action to stop them. Fortunately this was remedied in day two as they defeated Schalke 04 by creating opportunities for picks and advantageous fights to whittle down the gold disparity and regain control of the map.
One shining light of the first week of games will be the outstanding “Player of the Game” performance from AD Carry Juš “Crownshot” Marušič in SK’s victory over S04. Not only was the marksman’s positioning in teamfights stellar, but he also outclassed S04 Upset in terms of late game damage. Add this to rookie top laner Toni “Sacre” Sabalić’s auspicious start to his LEC campaign, and SK fans have a lot to look forward to for the rest of the Summer Split.