State of the League

Last week had lots and lots of competitive League of Legends for us, a merciful reprieve from the otherwise boring start to 2012 (y'know, from the competitive standpoint). IPL's Killing Spree continued into its second week, while IEM Kiev and the ONG Korean Invitational began and, um, ended. The following paragraphs contain SPOILERS about these events. Do NOT read further if you intend to watch the VODs for these events.

The headlining item, of course, was IEM Kiev. Eight teams were originally slated to meet, and that group was widdled down to four by Saturday morning. SK Gaming, Team Dignitas, Moscow 5 and Team SoloMid made the cut, with TSM and M5 edging over their competition to meet in the finals. While SK and Dignitas sorted out their third-place affair at an unreasonably early hour Sunday morning (where Team Dignitas would emerge the victor), TSM and M5 met later in the day. It took three games, but Moscow 5 ultimately ended up victorious, thus becoming the champions of IEM Kiev.

Meanwhile, Counter Logic Gaming.NA traveled to Korea to participate in OnGamingNetwork's League of Legends Invitational, where they met China's World Elite and Korean teams Extreme Dive Gaming and Maximum impact Gaming. (Side note: the Korean participants were determined by a mini tournament, which also included Team OP and StarTale.). Upon leaving group stage, both MiG and CLG.NA eached finished with two wins and one loss, and in turn faced each other at the finals. MiG then took the set 2-0, leaving the event the victor and current national champion.

Finally, IPL's Killing Spree continue last week, with reigning spree holders Counter Logic Gaming.NA competing against Curse Gaming. How did CLG manage this from Korea? Simple; Killing Spree is currently pre-recorded as IPL establishes its plan of attack. In a first for the series, the match went to three games. Curse Gaming, in convincing fashion, emerged the victor and now holds a spree of one. Which isn't really a spree, but I don't make up the rules for this event.

[Sources: ESL; Team Liquid; IPL on Twitch]