After many ups and downs, the group stage of LCK Summer 2023 has come to an end. It can be said that this group stage has been quite surprising for League of Legends (LoL) fans in general and LCK viewers in particular. Especially in the case of T1, who fell from the top group straight down to the middle group just weeks after Faker was absent. The team that benefited the most from this was DRX – the opponent that defeated T1 at the 2022 World Championship.
The reason is that DRX was the first team to face T1 right after Faker announced his injury break. And a surprise occurred when DRX managed to defeat T1 in that match. In the return leg, the same thing happened when DRX once again overcame T1 in Faker’s absence, becoming one of the three teams to defeat T1 in both rounds. Notably, the other two teams (KT Rolster and Gen.G) are both championship contenders, while DRX was struggling at the bottom of the standings.
It can be said that DRX is still competing for the final playoff spot in LCK Summer 2023 largely thanks to two victories against T1. As of before the upcoming final match against Kwangdong Freecs, DRX has only won 5 matches, 2 of which were against T1. Of course, DRX must wait for at least one more match to know their fate. At this moment, Liiv SANDBOX is sitting right above DRX.
Recently, in a statement ahead of the final match series, BeryL made some “messages” towards T1: “In the recent match between KDF and T1, there were some surprises in the draft phase. KDF still has enough time to prepare before the match with us, and we also need to improve our pick and ban phase. We probably have to try to win our match. But I also hope that my brothers at T1 can beat LSB.”
In fact, LSB still has 2 more matches but they are against very strong opponents (T1 and KT). Therefore, the chances of DRX advancing remain very bright as they only have to face KDF in their final match. And once BeryL and his teammates return to the playoffs, many people immediately think of DRX’s miraculous journey last year and hope for more surprises to come in the future.