That's three straight victories for Cloud9, who overcame a tough Team Dignitas to win the series 2-1 on Sunday during Week 4, Day 3 of the North American League of Legends Championship Series Summer Split in Los Angeles.
Each team would draft strong 5-vs-5 compositions in Game 1, but it was Team Dignitas who would put together a better start. Focusing on the middle and bottom lanes, Dignitas would run up an early lead in kills, turrets and gold. Cloud9 managed to momentarily stop the bleeding in the mid game, but still struggled to coordinate winning teamfights.
With a handful of its members without any abilities, Cloud9 was forced to watch all its hard work disappear as Dignitas would take the pivotal Baron buff late in the contest. Coupled with three Ocean Drakes, Dignitas would put together a furious power play. There was little Cloud9 could do to stop Dignitas from pushing its way to a series lead.
In Game 2, the teams switched up strategies and drafted split-push compositions, particularly hinging on the top lane matchup. Cloud9 top laner Jung "Impact" Eon-yeong struggled early on Renekton as Dignitas' top laner Kim "Ssumday" Chan-ho was dominating the damage trades on Fiora. However, Impact started to receive gank assistance and began to take the upper hand in the split-pushing matchup in the mid game.
With the top lane matchup secured, Cloud9 jungler Juan "Contractz" Garcia's Gragas was able to help the rest of his teammates take objectives all over the Rift. Falling into a nearly 9,000-gold deficit before the 25-minute mark, Dignitas could do nothing to stop Cloud9 from pushing into its base and evening up the series.
Team Dignitas tried to stick with its split-pushing composition to open Game 3, but it was clear Cloud9's strong teamfighting composition would have the advantage early. C9 got its damage carries off to strong starts with a five-man rotation into the bottom lane that yielded the first three kills of Game 3.
Dignitas did manage to find some picks, resulting in a handful of kills throughout the mid game, but it struggled to mount any kind of offense in 5-vs-5 situations. C9 would finally break the game wide open after a 4-for-0 teamfight win, securing a Baron kill and knocking down all of Dignitas' outer turrets. One final siege allowed Cloud9 to claim the victory and an undefeated weekend.
Cloud9's climb up the standings continues Friday against Team SoloMid at 6 p.m. ET. Team Dignitas battles struggling FlyQuest on Saturday at 6 p.m. ET.