EU Playoff Preview: Gambit VS Unicorns of Love

by Reece "SabrewoIf" Dos-Santos

For one team, this season has been the height of consistency - never pulling away and always remaining middle of the pack with a 1-1 record against all but two teams. For the other, it was an uphill battle against what looked like another dreary season, but they ended up in their best position since 2013. For both, it was a season of hope after impressive showings at IEM’s San Jose and Cologne respectively.

The Unicorns of Love stampeded into the European scene with probably the fastest growing fan base ever seen in a recently promoted amateur team. After their victory against TSM in San Jose, Power of Evil left with 10 times the amount of Twitter followers he had entered the tournament with. While the Unicorns haven’t quite pulled off the Cloud 9/Lemondogs effect of entering the scene and winning in their first split, they've put on a hell of show and could easily become one of EU’s best and biggest brands. What’s best about watching the Unicorns is simply how fun and energized they look; the enjoyment they’re getting from their experience is easy to see in their work ethic and reflects in their results. Especially in comparison to teams like Meet Your Makers and Elements who spent a good deal of time in a bubble of despair - a bubble that led to unmotivated and zombie like repetition of basic mistakes, mistrust in calls and underperforming.

Gambit, on the other hand, has been on a recovery mission after being one of EU’s biggest names and slowly falling away into irrelevance. Just as the above mentioned teams, Gambit also started off the season in an already established bubble of despair following a terrible 2014. Although IEM success provided a good recovery point, things still started off badly and looked to be a repeat of past EU LCS results. Needless to say. however, after the benching of NiQ and the picking up Betsy, this is the healthiest Gambit squad we've seen in over a year. Diamond finally seems revived and while not quite at the level he used to display, he’s still showing signs of the same spark before he dulled. For Gambit fans it’s a relief to see a squad that, despite failing to show up at IEM Katowice, looks like it can challenge for top spots and remain stable and healthy.

The Unicorns and Gambit stand 1-1 in their EU LCS series against each other with neither wins really providing a picture of how this match-up might turn out. The first win for the Unicorns being in Week 1 and the first of Gambit’s five game slump. In this match-up, Power Of Evil was allowed to play his signature Syndra and made great use of the soon-to-be-deleted item Deathfire Grasp to seize control and carry his team. In addition, every kill in the game bar one happened on Gambit’s side of the map. The only Unicorn that didn't completely outclass his match-up was Vizicsacsi.

One the flip side, the Unicorns had just gone 2-0 in Week 8 and therefore destiny required them to balance out and go 0-2 in Week 9 where they faced Gambit for a second time. While this match was more contested and actually had map-wide kill distribution, the game fell completely into Gambit’s hands as Power Of Evil’s new tank meta Cho’Gath pick didn't quite work out how it does in solo queue. This, and then the loss to the Giants to end the week, doesn't bode well for the Unicorns coming into playoffs but they aren't a team that has shown any tilting tendencies and I still expect their A game to be on.

For me, the match-up’s to look out for are in the Mid lane and the Jungle. If Power Of Evil and Kikis can pull away from Betsy and Diamond it's more than likely that the Unicorns will be able to trample Gambit. However, if those two lanes don’t go as planned, I worry for the Unicorns’ ability to comeback as I believe Gambit have the raw skill advantage in both the bottom lane and the top lane. But, on a whole team synergy level, the Unicorns are one of, if not the best teams in the EU LCS. They’re a team with full trust and belief in each other, and such a tight level of synergy is arguably the most dangerous element in professional League of Legends gameplay.

Love hurts.

Looking forward to the semi-final place these teams are fighting for, I also think it’s the Unicorns of Love that hold the advantage in a match-up against SK Gaming. The fact that SK are an objective based team and can be easily uprooted and overturned by disruptions to their game flow falls greatly into the Unicorns’ hooves. The fast paced and sometimes spontaneous shifts in game play, often started by Kikis, are a perfect combat strategy to EU’s strongest team. This was proved in Week 6 when the Unicorns handed SK one of their 3 losses in the split.

Gambit on the other hand has trouble making a comeback when teams outmuscle them in the earlier stages. Failure to secure dragons, barons and any more than 5 towers is also a dangerous habit among their losses. SK are the only team to 2-0 Gambit this split and I can’t see that trend changing in the playoffs, SK play Gambit’s game better.

Game prediction: Unicorns of Love 3-1

I believe in dark horses, and horned ones too.