A surging Echo Fox squad took on a struggling Team Liquid on Saturday in Week 3, Day 2 of the North American League of Legends Championship Series. With both teams in the hot seat, Liquid left the Los Angeles, CA studios with a sloppy but hard earned 2-1 series win.
Game 1 began very well for rookie jungler Matthew "Akaadian" Higginbotham's Kha'Zix, picking up first blood a minute into the game with a cheesy level one five-man stack. Akaadian continued to pop off, picking up more kills throughout the early game while Echo Fox rotated circles around Liquid. With Liquid mindful of Akaadian's assassination potential, Echo Fox acted with relative impunity in the mid game, dictating the pace of the contest. While Echo Fox had the occasional mishap, Akaadian's strong lead and a 4-for-1 teamfight at 34 minutes gave Echo Fox the first win of the series.
Despite controlling the early game in Game 2, Liquid never tried to force any big plays, instead dictating the pace of the game. Liquid finally jumped ahead after winning a 4-for-0 teamfight at 23 minutes that gave it a Baron kill, but could not fully capitalize on the buff despite the massive poke damage coming out of mid-laner Greyson "Goldenglue" Gilmer's Corki. Liquid almost completely lost their lead to Echo Fox late in the game, but managed to stay on top thanks to its objective control. Securing three Baron kills, Team Liquid managed to outlast Echo Fox in an arduous 58 minute game.
Emotions were high heading into a series-deciding Game 3, especially after Matt "Matt" Elento's support Lulu got killed by Austin "Gate" Yu's support Malzahar in a straight-up 2-vs-2 for first blood. Akaadian earned another strong start as well on Graves, picking up several early kills as Echo Fox held a commanding lead, but disaster struck for EF at 21 minutes. Risking an early Baron play, Echo Fox secured the Baron kill but lost the ensuing fight 3-for-0. After that, Liquid began taking regular teamfight wins, gaining momentum despite being down by as much as 5,000 gold at 15 minutes. Methodically starving Echo Fox of resources in the late game, Liquid took a 4-for-0 teamfight to complete the 2-1 series win in just under 40 minutes.