League of Legends news » Daily Worlds Recap: KT Rolster

It was a long road for KT Rolster to their first World Championship. But now, the team that made it to the LCK Summer Finals three years in a row has not only made it to Worlds, but is heading to the Quarterfinals as Group D's No. 1 seed.

Group D was full of surprises, and KT's week was certainly one of them. The Korean team went 5-1 en-route to their 1st place finish, with their only loss coming in Week 1 at the hands of Group D's No. 2 seed, Origen. And just like in the LCK Summer Split, KT only continued to improve over time.

KT's improvements from the end of LCK Summer into Worlds have often been attributed to the addition of their support, Jong-bum "Piccaboo" Lee. He joined the team in the second half of the 2015 LCK Summer Split and brought with him the confidence and macro knowledge to lead a struggling team to success. With Piccaboo leading the charge, the team that finished 5th place in Spring catapulted all the way to the Worlds Quarterfinals.

"There was a change in the sense that he brought a lot of positive energy into the team because he's very proactive with his feedback," says KT's coach, Chang Jong. "While they're playing the game, he's also very confident and willing to talk about the tactics during the game. And I think that also influences the other team members to be more enthusiastic and willing to put in their input as well."

His praise continues. "He also helped a lot with vision with wards, and the map movement in general became a lot faster after he joined," says Coach Jong. "He had a lot of positive influence on the team."

Piccaboo's positive and determined outlook brought synergy to the team, according to Coach Jong. "[His attitude] helped the other team members gain confidence. With a strong foundation of good teamwork and positive spirits, I think that eventually helped KT come to Worlds."

Once they made it to Paris, KT saw success in the first week of Groups, narrowly dropping only one game to Origen. The game was like a chess match and was one of the closest of the Group Stages so far, with KT making a move, then Origen responding accordingly. It could have gone either way, until Origen saw multiple KT members hovering around the bottom of the map and went for a quick Baron. The call pushed Origen into the lead, and from there, they never let go.

"In the last game, they had a Baron call, and we forgot they could Baron," admits Piccaboo. "We completely missed that play."

In every other game of the Group Stages, KT wasn't perfect -- but from Week 1 to 2 they improved exponentially, and it especially showed during their first game of Week 2 against China's LGD Gaming. Mordekaiser, one of the most contested picks at Worlds 2015 so far, made it through the pick and ban phase, and KT wasted no time scooping him up.

What followed was textbook KT -- Piccaboo roamed the map alongside jungler Dong-bin "Score" Go, blanketing LGD's map in wards. The result was Yong-Quan "TBQ" Zhu's Evelynn wasn't able to sneak around or make any picks without KT being able to quickly react to his movements. Meanwhile, KT's mid laner Sang-moon "Nagne" Kim finally came out of his shell, and did the most damage of anyone in the game on Lulu, while AD carry Dong-hyeon "Arrow" No showed no mercy with Mordekaiser, going 7/0/6.

"Last week, Nagne didn't show his full potential during the games," says Coach Jong. "He went through a slump and mentally he was very down. Because of that, I reminded him of the Summer Season. It was similar and he also went through a slump -- but he was able to overcome that slump and eventually make it to the Finals. So I just reminded him of how, 'Yeah, you did it in the Summer, you can do it right now!' and gave him a lot of confidence to have confidence in himself. I think, through that mental re-energization, he was able to focus more on the matches."

In their rematch against Origen, KT came well prepared. Pride was on the line, as they were facing off against the only team they had lost to so far. But more importantly, a No. 1 seed was up for grabs. The winner would avoid facing the undefeated SKTelecom T1 in the Knockout Stage. Piccaboo explained how he knew KT had mistakes to fix from other games as well, but they made sure they wouldn't lose in the same manner to Origen's Double Teleport strategy this time around.

"We don't think Double Teleport is the most important aspect of OG. We think xPeke and Mithy are very good players -- that's why we think OG is so good," says Piccaboo. Coach Jong agrees, explaining how before KT came to Worlds, they expected many teams to use the strategy and did a lot of prior preparation to deal with it. "I don't think the Teleports are bad or anything, but they aren't the most important part [of Origen]. The key part is xPeke is great at this game and Mithy makes a lot of plays," says Piccaboo.

From the beginning of the rematch it looked like KT were intent on camping top laner Paul "SoaZ" Boyer, giving up four Flashes just to bring him down. But according to Piccaboo, that wasn't the case. "He kept making it easy to gank him. There's no reason why [we camped him]. It wasn't like, 'We hate SoaZ, we will kill him at all times.' He gave us an opportunity. There were no wards, so that's why we killed SoaZ."

They ended up killing SoaZ a lot. The top laner finished the game at 0/9/3, while KT used the synergy of their own global Teleporting composition to take over the game and lock down the No. 1 seed in their Group.

"We're proud of ourselves because we beat Origen. We are proud of our plays and our team," says Piccaboo. "In my opinion, for me personally, I didn't show 100% of my abilities. I sucked at times. I missed things, abilities, and was shotcalling badly. I am kind of disappointed in myself."

"[I think I can play any better]. I need to practice more, be hard on myself, and keep getting better and improving myself," he continues. "Because if I make a mistake, my team will lose...I think maybe I played 60% of what I can."

Coach Jong however was pleased with the growth of KT over the Group Stage. "I believe that if we have enough confidence that we're just as good as other teams, or even better, I think we'll be able to continue to excel and move up the ladder at Worlds...Gaining that confidence I think is what I'm going to focus on for the next round."

Lucky for him, he's got a team captain who's determined to help KT go all the way. "I'm not going say, 'We're going to beat [SKTelecom T1] or own them,' but we need to beat them because our plan is to be the World Championship winner. So it doesn't matter what team comes, we need to win the fights, go to next round, and beat them all."

You can find out who KT Rolster will face off against in the Quarterfinals during the Group Draw after the final games tomorrow. The Quarterfinals will kick off in London, England on Thursday, October 15 at 17:00 BST / 9:00 AM PT.

For more Worlds 2015 coverage, head over to Lolesports.com.

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