The LEC 2024 Spring Playoffs kick off this Saturday. Read on to learn all about the exciting match-ups that await, and try to predict the winners yourself!
Regular Season Recap
Unlike in Winter, the Spring Split regular season was a lot less lop-sided. There was no clear first place team like G2 Esports in Winter, towering over the rest of the LEC alongside Team BDS - whom they had decisively defeated. This time around, four teams share first place and a 67% win rate. Fnatic beat G2, but lost to Team Heretics, who lost to G2 Esports, who lost to Team Vitality. This promises an exciting playoffs, but maybe a less exciting MSI - if we are to believe that our European teams are less consistent than last Split.
After a 3-0 final weekend, GIANTX secured Playoffs once again. Meanwhile SK Gaming had to battle Rogue for the final spot in Playoffs, having struggled all Split in spite of their promising Winter performances. They did indeed manage to defeat Rogue in a tiebreaker on Monday, making this the second Split in a row that Rogue failed to make Playoffs - a situation Karmine Corp has found themselves in as well.
Playoffs Format
Just like in Winter, there will be eight participating teams, and just like in Winter, this means all of the LEC teams except for Karmine Corp and Rogue. The eight teams will be playing in a double elimination bracket, which means that a team needs to lose two best-of-three matches before they are eliminated fully.
There will be four rounds of matches before the finals. The first two will be best-of-three matches, and the rest will be best-of-five.
The stakes? The winner automatically qualifies for the 2024 Mid-Season Invitational (MSI), to represent Europe alongside G2 Esports, and the LEC 2024 Season Finals; which will directly decide who will attend Worlds 2024 down the line. If G2 Esports wins, the team with the second highest amount of Championship Points will qualify. At the time of writing this article, the top three teams in terms of Championship Points aside from G2 Esports are MAD Lions KOI, Team BDS, and Fnatic.
Photo by Colin Young-Wolff/Riot Games.
Playoffs Bracket
Taking a look at this graphic made by the LEC, you can see that the games will kick off this Saturday, on the 30th of March, starting at 17:00 CET. The first showdown will feature Team Vitality and SK Gaming. Later on in the day, Fnatic and GIANTX will have their series as well. Usually the second series of the day will occur around 20:00 CET.
G2 Esports versus MAD Lions KOI, and Team Heretics versus Team BDS, can be watched on Sunday, the 31st of March, with the latter starting up at 17:00 CET as well.
The full Spring Playoffs bracket. Image sourced from LEC’s X.
Fnatic versus GIANTX
This Spring, Fnatic was one of four teams to share first place, with a winrate of 67% and a scoreline of 6-3. Unlike in Winter, Fnatic has done well throughout the Regular Season, even going as far as beating both Team Vitality and G2 Esports, fellow first-place-holders. They lost to Team Heretics, MAD Lions KOI, and Team BDS. While the latter two haven't had as impressive of a Split as Winter, they are still good teams in their own right and losing to them is no shame.
GIANTX, on the other hand, struggled throughout the Regular Season, only being able to secure one win throughout the first two weeks. However, they turned things around this past weekend, beating Rogue, Team Vitality, and Team Heretics. As we know from the standings, two of these teams ended up in first place - beating them is no small feat whatsoever, and with this 3-0 week, GIANTX truly earned their right to playoffs.
Going back to Week 2, GIANTX and Fnatic played on Saturday, with the game swinging heavily into Fnatic's favour. Oscarinin earned MVP on his 13 KDA Ornn, while Odoamne, his lane opponent, went 0-6-0. The game ended 27 minutes in, after Fnatic had secured their flawless Dragon Soul. Suffice it to say, it was not a close game.
So, that leaves us with a prediction to make. Sure, in the head to head, GIANTX lost, but that was before whatever event made them go 3-0 in the final week of the Regular Season, so perhaps there’s a small chance GIANTX will surprise us again. But, most likely, this series should be a 2-0 for Fnatic.
Photo by Michal Konkol/Riot Games
Team Vitality versus SK Gaming
After several unfortunate splits strung together in the past couple of years, Team Vitality can finally say they've got a great chance to make top three in the LEC after their performance in the Regular Season. Aside from Fnatic, all of their Regular Season losses have been to teams far below them in the standings, which of course means that Vitality has been defeating even top teams like G2 Esports and Team Heretics.
SK Gaming is one of the three teams that managed to defeat Team Vitality, way back in Week 1 of the Regular Season. They then went on to lose almost every other game, and only narrowly made Playoffs by defeating Rogue in a tiebreaker this past Monday. Whatever promise and potential they showed last year, and even this year in Winter, seems to have vanished this Spring.
In spite of SK's head-to-head advantage, this series is skewed heavily in Team Vitality's favour, and we predict an easy 2-0 on Saturday.
Photo by Michal Konkol/Riot Games
G2 Esports versus MAD Lions KOI
A rematch between the Winter finalists would normally be quite exciting, however, it seems that MDK’s Spring performance overall has been lacking compared to Winter. Even in the last split, when MAD Lions KOI was seemingly at the top of their game, G2 Esports had little trouble dispatching the team. Now, with MDK having found themselves near the bottom of the standings, and G2 still reigning supreme, it seems like there is even a smaller chance for an upset to happen.
In their head-to-head match during the first weekend of the Regular Season, it was G2 that took the win. G2 was able to close out the match in 28 minutes, with an especially impressive performance from Hans Sama on Kog'Maw duty.
MDK sat on only two wins overall in those first two weeks, and were poised to possibly miss out on Playoffs entirely, before a rather impressive Week 3 performance.The wins they earned against Fnatic and Team BDS were enough to secure Playoffs. Although it seems like they’re on an upward trajectory, and although they did manage to beat Fnatic, we’re going to predict another 2-0 in this match-up.
Photo by Michal Konkol/Riot Games
Team Heretics versus Team BDS
In our final Upper Bracket best-of-three match-up, Team Heretics will face Team BDS in what I would definitely call the match of the week.
Team Heretics has had a bit of a tumultous LEC experience thus far, having been decidedly middle-of-the-pack, at best, throughout 2023. In Winter 2024, they came back with a reforged team, but finished 7th overall. Now, with a new support and mid lane in place, things finally seem to be clicking for the team. They've only lost to G2 Esports, and then, rather unexpectedly, to Karmine Corp and GIANTX in Week 3.
Team BDS has had the opposite journey. 2023 was the first year that they'd really showed any potential, even making it to finals in the Spring Season, and attending Worlds the same year. They finished third in the Winter Regular Season, but fifth overall. Spring 2024 has been less successful, and while they have consistently been defeating the mid-to-bottom teams, they have also lost to all of the top teams aside from Fnatic.
The above goes for Team Heretics as well. In their head-to-head in Week 2, Team Heretics had closed out the match with nearly a 15k gold advantage, and Flakked with a scoreline of 10-0. With that in mind, we're going to predict that Team Heretics take this series, but expect a bit of bite from Team BDS as well. 2-1!
Photo by Michal Konkol/Riot Games
