Misfits beat first-placed MAD Lions in their last game before the final superweek of the 2022 LEC Summer Split regular season. MAD Lions were looking for a win to lock in their spot in the playoffs stage, but Misfits stole that victory from them thanks to a deadly combination of a cat and a rat.
From the beginning of the game, League fans had their eyes pointed towards the bot lane where Misfits displayed the aggressive and mortal combo of Twitch and Yuumi, while MAD Lions opted for a sparkling duo of Zeri and Rakan. According to Matúš “Neon” Jakubčík, the “cat is still very broken as a champion,” as he said in the post-game interview, and that’s why Misfits locked it first during draft. That duo would be proven to be the core of Misfits’ strategy towards victory.
However, MAD Lions obtained first blood thanks to a perfectly-timed invasion in their opponents’ jungle that led Elyoya to take down Zanzarah’s Trundle. Misfits quickly caught up with the uneven kill score by catching their enemy on the top lane off guard. The early game lead seemed to oscillate between the two teams, with MAD Lions, who controlled the mid-to-bot space thanks to the vision set to control the movements of the enemy bot lane, and Misfits, who found the right proactive plays onto their opponents.
Fifteen minutes into the game, MAD Lions were in slight advantage in gold, kills, and towers, but Misfits didn’t let the gap widen. Misfits stayed on the trail of their opponents with positive cross-map actions. MAD Lions got impatient and greedy. They set up a gank in the bot lane to shut down the evident threat of Neon’s Twitch, but the play backfired when Misfits caught them in the Magical Cat’s ultimate ability, dooming them to a swift and toxic death by Twitch’s projectiles.
Despite MAD Lions retaining the gold and tower lead at 20 minutes, Misfits have all the right tools to pavement their path to victory. So when the former sets up a trap around the drake’s pit, the latter crushes them down and solidifies their place and lead in the game. With many items and damage on their side, Misfits moved towards the Baron. MAD Lions intercepted them, and a fight broke out, but only Misfits members stood tall when the dust settled. With the Baron buff for their whole team and no opponents alive to stop them, Misfits started besieging MAD Lions’ base.
MAD Lions rose to make one last stand in defense of their Nexus, but the late-game power spike from Misfits’ components is too high to surpass. Misfits sliced through the enemy team and collected their fourth consecutive win, solidifying their place on the podium of the LEC Summer Split regular season.
The first place on the leaderboard is still occupied by MAD Lions, though the team still has one more victory before they can confirm their spot in the playoffs. While Misfits is on a roll with four consecutive wins, they will have to win two more games before they can taste the victory of qualifying for playoffs.
One last week separates the first and second stage of the LEC Summer Split, and both teams still have three matches to take on before the end of the regular season.
