Ahead of the inaugural LTA split, analysts were generally in agreement on what to expect: Team Liquid and FlyQuest would joust for the trophy, with everyone else remaining a step behind. This assumption was based on the two frontrunners’ recent performances: at Worlds, FLY earned international attention for their impressive performances against GenG and Hanwha Life Esports, and TL — the Summer Split runners-up — were their primary domestic challengers. Despite the lofty expectations at their backs, though, both teams faltered, and only narrowly qualified for the first-ever LTA playoffs as the North’s third and fourth seeds.

Regardless, many still thought of FLY as the favorites for the title. They seemed like victims of a single off day in an unforgiving format. But the story with TL was different. They looked lost.

During the regular season, TL were uncharacteristically prone to mistakes — mere shadows of the team that dominated the LCS for almost all of 2024. In the São Paulo quarterfinals, TL was the only LTAN team to drop a game to their LTAS opponent, only managing to finally turn it around in the final two days of the split. Early in the tournament, they were sent to the lower bracket by 100 Thieves but made a heroic run all the way through to the finals, where they faced off against 100 Thieves yet again. This time, TL was able to exact their revenge in a 3-0 stomp, which helped them qualify for First Stand. 

TL’s turnaround wasn’t just a matter of individual play. The whole team kicked into gear, adjusting to the limitations of Fearless Draft, the new lane swap meta, and an entirely new format. They’d been quietly refining their play, working to reassert their winning formula in a historically short split. To better understand TL’s path to the trophy, we partnered with SAP to take a data-forward, analytical look at the team’s Split 1 journey. Let’s see how, from their individual performances to overall playstyle, TL fought their way to the first LTA trophy.

Kicking into gear for the Cross-Conference stage

Last year, TL were known as early-game monsters. As one of the best teams in the world at executing lane swaps, they consistently found massive gold leads before teamfights could even begin. But at the outset of Split 1, lane swaps were simplified, and the team lost their early-game edge. That didn’t mean, however, that they stopped being an early-game-oriented team.

Unlike most LCS splits — and most League of Legends tournaments in general — the LTA Split 1 format saw almost every team playing a completely different number of games, against a wide variety of opponents. On their own, normal performance stats mean almost nothing, since every team won and lost a completely different number of games and no teams had schedules of equivalent strength.

For example, though they won far more games — and generally played better — in the Cross-Conference stage, TL had the highest team XP differential at 15 in the LTAN (1293), but dropped to a near 0 average XP differential in São Paulo. Their opponents in the playoffs were stronger teams overall, and were better-equipped to mitigate TL’s early-game strength. Naturally, they put up a better fight, and at first glance, they could have diminished TL’s impressive stats. However, these effects can be isolated and controlled.

These graphs show Gold differential at 15 minutes, a solid metric for a team’s early-game performance. They’re contextualized by the game result and the number of games played, caveats that help control for the wide disparity in strength-of-schedule caused by the format. Immediately, a pattern emerges: TL were outliers, even when they lost almost half of their games domestically.

In LTAN wins, TL was up the most gold of any team at 15 minutes (behind only DSG, who only won a single game that they happened to stomp). Even in eventual losses, they had the lowest average GD15 in the North Conference. TL’s marquee laning prowess meant that even in losing games, their stats stayed stable far longer than any other team’s — and considering that they lost more games than almost any other team in the regular season, to a wide array of opponents, it’s a good indicator of where their strengths lie.

Despite losing their advantage in lane swap theory, TL were still an aggressive, early-game-focused team. They just weren’t as good at converting those leads into wins, especially before reaching São Paulo. In both stages, they fell just short of the combined kills per minute of 100 Thieves, an infamously aggressive team (usually to their detriment). TL also boasted the second-highest First Tower rate in both stages (75%, 78%), behind only FLY (88%, 80%).

For years, North America’s best teams were criticized for relying on passive scaling strategies against top teams. Domestically, the best teams could reliably win trophies by sitting back and waiting for their opponents to bleed themselves dry. But in recent years, top LCS (now LTAN) teams have worked on their laning phase play, hoping to be able to hold their own against the best LCK and LPL teams. In 2024, FLY and TL used those skills to deliver NA’s best performances against top LPL and LCK teams in years. TL weren’t always winning their games, especially in the regular season, but they were always taking opportunities to find leads, trade objectives, and fight through the game — a part of their identity Yeon claimed the team lost at First Stand.

Yeon: The best player in the LTA

Last year, Yeon was unequivocally the best ADC in the LCS — and until FlyQuest’s Massu put on a masterclass at Worlds, he also had the strongest international performances. This year, though, Yeon has somehow leveled up even further. Though TL struggled at times, Yeon distinguished himself as the best player in the region, individually playing like an international-class ADC and dominating his opponents — even with the rest of the map falling apart.

With the highest First Blood rate of any ADC during conference play and the highest GD10 of any ADC in São Paulo, Yeon was clearly TL’s focus in the early game. Yeon and CoreJJ weren’t playing the Kalista, Ashe, or Draven lanes that earned them renown as the best laning duo in the West, but they were still consistently creating leads against the best bot lanes in the LTA.

As they tore through the Cross-Conference stage, Yeon built up an impressive array of gold-medal stats, blowing every other LTA ADC out of the water: 59 Kills (#1), 10.0 KDA (#1), 75.5% Kill Participation (#1), 37.1% Kill Share (#1), 11.0% Death Share (#1), and 256 GD10 (#1). In Damage Per Minute, the bread-and-butter of ADC stats, he was narrowly beaten by paiN Gaming’s TitaN, though the Brazilian ADC played only two games to Yeon’s nine.

Of course, a clean look at the stats of the best team at a tournament doesn’t tell you who the best players are. His dominant headline stats are impressive, but not unexpected for a top team’s core carry. Yeon was given carry champions in draft, jungle attention in early game, and resources in mid game. A good ADC with a lead can win a game. A top-tier ADC can build that lead themselves or win without it.

Though TL’s early games were overall stable, even in the regular season, Yeon generally had a large gold deficit in eventual losses. With Yeon behind, it didn’t matter what the rest of the team accomplished around the map. He ended up with one of the best KDA’s among losing ADC’s; he was still impacting the map and keeping his DPM up (#3 in losses), but if he was behind early it wasn’t enough for TL to win the game.

Smaller gold and XP leads in the Cross-Conference stage, in raw numbers, don’t necessarily imply a lower level of play in early games. Because of their early loss to 100T in the North Conference, TL played several games against far weaker opponents during the regular season. In the playoffs, they played only strong teams. In São Paulo, their opponents were far less likely to fall into massive early-game deficits than teams like Dignitas or Shopify Rebellion — slightly improved relative stats are even more meaningful than they may initially appear.

On the other hand, Cloud9’s Zven technically claimed the #1 GD14 of ADCs in the Cross-Conference stage, despite not only losing to Yeon, but also going even or falling behind at 14 minutes in all three games of their series. C9 beat LOUD so thoroughly in the quarterfinals, which accounted for two of C9’s five playoffs games, that Zven’s stats were irrevocably skewed. In this format, the old-fashioned way is the best way to confirm a player’s level of performance: just watch them dominate.

TL’s strategy of building a victory on Yeon’s back wasn’t infallible. Even in the Cross-Conference stage, the team was susceptible to fumbling its leads. In their two playoffs losses, Yeon was up more gold at 14 than he was in their wins, meaning the losses came after disproportionate leads. Yeon was the key to their wins, but — as he said himself — the team needed to evolve past that to achieve their competitive ambitions.

"To be honest, I don't like [being the supercarry] that much. I prefer if everyone's playing well. So hopefully, everyone's playing well and I just look normal — [and] we just win."
— Yeon in an LTA post-match press conference

Individual improvement for UmTi and APA

When UmTi and APA struggle, TL don’t look like themselves. The decisions of a mid-jungle duo on an early-game-oriented team are make-or-break. For that reason, when TL unexpectedly fell to fourth place in the regular season, criticism centered on these two;. Then, as Umti and APA improved their individual play, the team’s results did a complete 180.

Until the final weekend of the Cross-Conference stage, UmTi struggled to connect with the team and meet his usual competitive standard. Even with a simple eye test, he consistently made baffling decisions and died in increasingly unbelievable ways. In both stages, he had the highest team death share of any jungler (25.8% and 25.7%) and set the all-time LCS death record in TL’s series against 100T (12 deaths).

Though criticism of UmTi eclipsed criticism of APA, the sophomore mid laner also performed below expectations domestically. He had undeniably solid performances against lower-seeded mid laners like Palafox and Keine — he went 7/3/4 & 6/2/11 against Dignitas and 4/1/12 & 3/1/6 against SR — but was thoroughly routed by 100T’s Quid in their first matchup. Summer 2024’s first-team All-Pro mid laner looked like he could no longer stand against the highest echelon of LTA mids anymore.

Even when isolating two players, the format makes it incredibly difficult to meaningfully analyze their stats relative to the rest of the league. TL played the most games of any team by far, so their direct opponents varied wildly.

As a jungler, UmTi faced everyone from Dignitas’s Lira — a substitute jungler who retired five years ago —  to FlyQuest’s Inspired. Flat statistical comparisons in such an asymmetrical format mean nothing. Luckily, Team Liquid faced 100 Thieves twice in Split 1: once in a Bo3 during domestic play, and once in the grand finals of the Cross-Conference stage. The former was a 2-1 victory for 100T that felt like a 3-0 stomp, while the latter was 3-0 revenge for TL.

The most impactful change APA and UmTi made for the rematch against 100T was simple: they returned to their comfort picks. UmTi’s most-played champions in 2024 were Maokai, Sejuani, and Xin Zhao. 100T, perhaps overconfident after their early triumph, gave him all three picks in the series, in order of priority, and the best enabling jungler of 2024 could finally play his game.

In their first matchup, UmTi averaged a gold lead and a small XP deficit against River at 14 minutes, with 20% of his team’s damage. In the Grand Finals rematch, it flipped — UmTi had significant gold, XP, and CS deficits, and his damage share dropped to 14%. Though TL fell behind in two out of three games, UmTi played exactly the role his team needed. He didn’t need to do damage or find solo picks on Zyra or Vi. He just needed to keep his own game relatively stable until he could find teamfight engages to win the game. TL’s 2024 formula, revisited.

In the regular season, APA played mostly Azir and Taliyah, pulling out Aurora and Galio only when he faced 100T. Ziggs, Aurelion Sol, Neeko, and Cassiopeia were APA’s signature champions when he entered the LTA, and the added pressure of Fearless should’ve helped him rely on them more often, something he finally took advantage of. He’s certainly become a credible threat on other champions, and it makes sense that he wanted to practice them onstage, but these are his highest-win rate, most-played champions for a reason — he’s world-class on these picks.

Quid had the series of his life against APA in the regular season. He basically farmed clips three games in a row. Their laning stats, however, don’t show much of a disparity. In both matches, gold and XP leads at 14 minutes were narrow; even on his signature champions, APA isn’t known as a particularly lane-dominant player. Watching the first series back, though, tells a different story — Quid began running the map well before 14 minutes, even if it didn’t net him a massive gold lead.

In their first series, Quid had a whopping 32.40% of his team’s damage at 14 minutes, 8.04% higher than APA. In the rematch, they matched each other at around 26%. Like UmTi, APA’s comfort champions didn’t let him shut Quid down early, they just kept the lane stable until they reached their win conditions. On Ziggs and Aurelion Sol, he was able to scale until 100 Thieves couldn’t play the game anymore, without any of the playmaking pressure of champions like Aurora and Galio. On Neeko, he executed teamfight-winning engages with a champion he mastered years ago — far simpler than on his newly stage-ready Azir.

Looking ahead to Split 2

Team Liquid had a rollercoaster LTA debut. Early in the split, familiar strategies failed them, and they struggled to execute gameplans they’d once mastered. When the playoffs began in São Paulo, most agreed that TL weren’t just the fourth seed on paper, or due to a chance upset — they truly looked like the weakest team from North America by far.

A stumble, given Split 1’s condensed format, could’ve proven fatal. But with only two days left in the split, TL finally found their footing by drawing upon the strategies that helped them conquer the LCS in the preceding year. Even when they were struggling, the most important pieces of their map to victory — namely, phenomenal individual play from Yeon and consistent early-game leads around the map — were always just below the surface, waiting to be put into place.

Team Liquid will return to the LTA on April 5th, facing off against FlyQuest in the opening match of the split.