T1 Takes Down Kwangdong Freecs, Aria Makes His LCK Debut

T1 intimidated its rivals

The 2022 LCK Spring Split kicked off with four rip-roaring matches in the first two days. T1, who thought to finish the regular season as the leader, started spring season by taking down Kwangdong Freecs (formerly AFC) with an outstanding performance led by Faker. Although Kwangdong Freecs have two threatening weapons, Kiin and Teddy, they could not resist T1’s domination.

After meeting expectations at Worlds 2021, T1 probably will be one of the big brothers of the league, considering the game mind they showed off in their first series. They won’t have to play a strong side in top lane anymore, which gives T1 more space in their difficult matches. Keria continues to rule over bot lane as he did in the 2021 World Championship, and this time Gumayusi seemed to have adapted his game style.

Here are the results for the first two days of the 2022 LCK Spring Split

Day 1

• DRX 0 — 2 Liiv SANDBOX
• T1 2 — 0 Kwangdong Freecs

Day 2

• Hanwha Life 2 — 1 Nongshim RedForce
• KT Rolster 0 — 2 Damwon KIA

Aria, who drew attention with his solid performance in DFM, joined KT Rolster to show that he can compete in the highest stage of Korea. KT also gained Rascal, who parted ways with GEN, and former T1 jungler, Cuzz.

KT started the regular season with a defeat against DWG KIA, one of the favorite teams of the championship. Aria picked Zoe in his first LCK match and looked he has to adapt to playing against elite mid laners such as Showmaker. Even though he could not make as much impact as Showmaker did, Aria gave fans hope that he could keep up with his team in the coming weeks.

Speaking of which, KT should focus on playing around neutral objectives as the match goes into the mid-late game. Even though they took the gold lead in their hands, they lost the first game of the series because of the macro decisions they made led by Cuzz. He was not on his day along with Rascal. If KT improves their macro game plan, they could be a competitive team for the playoffs.

The remaining schedule for the first week is as follows:

Friday

• GEN vs DRX
• BRO vs T1

Saturday

• Nongshim RedForce vs Liiv SANDBOX
• Kwangdong Freecs vs KT Rolster

Sunday

• Hanwha Life vs BRO
• Damwon KIA vs GEN

The match of the week between DWG and GEN is set to play on Friday. GEN will try to take down one of its toughest rivals on the way to the championship. Chovy and Showmaker will face off again after DWG KIA beat Hanwha Life in the 2021 Summer Split, five months ago. You can watch this hectic series on LCK’s official Twitch channel.