Top laner Choi “Zeus” Woo-je had six deaths and zero kills in game two. T1 were trailing by nearly 6.4K gold for the most part. Then, a single defensive Featherstorm from Lee “Gumayusi” Min-hyeong unknowingly changed the outcome of the game, and ultimately, the series.

In game one, Ryu “Keria” Min-seo brought out Heimerdinger support paired with Ashe to dominate lane. In game two, after Royal Never Give Up locked in Nautilus, he countered with Renata. T1 then last picked Xayah on red side after assessing RNG’s bruiser comp.

Still, it was a struggle. Yan “Wei” Yang-Wei’s Sejuani heavily focused on top lane to get Chen “Breathe” Chen’s Fiora ahead, which put Zeus on the backfoot. On the other side of the map, T1’s champions still needed time to scale and could not find clear advantages elsewhere — until this one fight at Elder Dragon.

T1 Gumayusi used Featherstorm to avoid Glacial Prison — and it was genius

RNG vs T1 game two of Worlds 2022 semifinals post-game stats
Credit: Riot Games

Things were dire in the late game, but T1 held on and defended their base, only losing one mid lane inhibitor. 37-minutes in, Elder Dragon had spawned. RNG had Cloud Soul and this buff would’ve guaranteed victory.

Wei’s Sejuani opened the skirmish, trading ultimates with Gumayusi’s Xayah. Because of this, her feathers covered two-thirds of the river. RNG were forced to avoid this area, for Bladecaller hadn’t been used.

Clumped up next to the wall at dragon pit, Shi “Ming” Sen-Ming’s Nautilus found a hook onto Keria, but no one could follow up because RNG had no space to maneuver. Taking advantage of the situation, Lee “Faker” Sang-hyeok’s Akali jumped in with Twilight Shroud to further divide the battlefield.

Stuck between a rock and hard place, literally, RNG lined up for Keria’s Hostile Takeover. At this point, the fight was T1’s to win as Chen “GALA” Wei and Li “Xiaohu” Yuan-Hao were completely zoned out from the rest of their squad. All this while, Xayah’s feathers laid on the ground, a silent unmoving threat as Guma continued to hold onto Bladecaller in order to limit RNG’s positioning.

In a blink of an eye, the LCK second seed killed four, secured the Elder Dragon buff and Baron, and never looked back. They rode on this momentum all the way until the end of game three for the sweep, winning the MSI 2022 finals rematch against RNG.

Finishing with a perfect 7/0/4 in game two, Gumayusi was awarded the MVP.

T1 will go up against LPL’s first seed JD Gaming in the semifinals. Watch the 2022 World Championship matches live on Riot Games’ official channels on Twitch and YouTube.

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