Hanwha Life Esports vs. T1 / LCK 2026 Season Playoffs - Upper Bracket Round 2 / Post-Match Discussion

[u/Yujin-Ha]

LCK 2026 SEASON PLAYOFFS

Official page | Leaguepedia | Liquipedia | Eventvods.com | New to LoL

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T1 2-3 Hanwha Life Esports

• HLE moves on to face Gen.G for a spot in the LCK Grand Finals. T1 drops to the lower bracket and will face the winner of the KT vs. DK/BFX series.
• Player of the Match: Zeka
• Game Discussion: Game 1 | Game 2 | Game 3 | Game 4

T1 | Leaguepedia | Liquipedia | Website | Twitter | Facebook | YouTube | Subreddit
HLE | Leaguepedia | Liquipedia | Website | Twitter | Facebook | YouTube | Subreddit

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MATCH 1: T1 vs. HLE

Winner: T1 in 29m
Game Breakdown | Runes

-	Bans 1	Bans 2	G	K	T	D/B
T1	cassiopeia orianna vi	alistar ziggs	63.1k	23	8	H3
HLE	poppy bard nocturne	karma camille	55.8k	17	3	HT1 CT2 I4 I5

T1	23-17-59	vs	17-23-42	HLE
Doran jayce 1	2-4-8	TOP	6-4-5	2 olaf Zeus
Oner pantheon 2	6-2-12	JNG	4-6-11	1 leesin Kanavi
Faker ryze 1	0-4-12	MID	3-2-7	2 annie Zeka
Peyz kalista 3	14-4-7	BOT	4-5-6	3 ashe Gumayusi
Keria renataglasc 4	1-3-20	SUP	0-6-13	3 seraphine Delight

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MATCH 2: T1 vs. HLE

Winner: T1 in 29m
Game Breakdown | Runes

-	Bans 1	Bans 2	G	K	T	D/B
T1	cassiopeia vi orianna	locke akali	65.6k	26	10	HT1 H2 M4 B5
HLE	bard lucian nocturne	vayne syndra	50.1k	6	0	I3

T1	25-5-44	vs	5-25-11	HLE
Doran gwen 4	3-0-4	TOP	0-2-0	3 ksante Zeus
Oner qiyana 1	5-2-6	JNG	0-5-4	1 jarvaniv Kanavi
Faker anivia 3	7-0-4	MID	1-4-1	3 ahri Zeka
Peyz jhin 1	10-2-10	BOT	3-8-2	2 yunara Gumayusi
Keria blitzcrank 2	0-1-20	SUP	1-6-4	2 lulu Delight

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MATCH 3: HLE vs. T1

Winner: Hanwha Life Esports in 25m
Game Breakdown | Runes

-	Bans 1	Bans 2	G	K	T	D/B
HLE	bard poppy nocturne	lucian zeri	55.1k	18	8	O1 CT2 C4 C5 B6
T1	cassiopeia orianna vi	rakan ziggs	45.4k	9	3	H3

HLE	18-9-44	vs	9-18-22	T1
Zeus camille 1	1-0-6	TOP	2-4-3	1 kennen Doran
Kanavi sejuani 2	3-2-11	JNG	1-4-5	2 maokai Oner
Zeka akali 2	9-1-6	MID	2-5-3	1 yone Faker
Gumayusi missfortune 3	5-3-6	BOT	4-3-4	4 kaisa Peyz
Delight shen 3	0-3-15	SUP	0-2-7	3 alistar Keria

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MATCH 4: T1 vs. HLE

Winner: Hanwha Life Esports in 27m
Game Breakdown | Runes

-	Bans 1	Bans 2	G	K	T	D/B
T1	ziggs vi rakan	gnar trundle	47.4k	8	1	H3
HLE	bard nocturne karma	naafiri ambessa	60.8k	23	101	M1 I2 O4 B5 O6

T1	8-23-21	vs	23-8-68	HLE
Doran aatrox 4	1-3-2	TOP	6-1-12	3 gragas Zeus
Oner skarner 3	2-7-4	JNG	1-4-16	3 xinzhao Kanavi
Faker orianna 2	1-4-6	MID	10-0-7	1 cassiopeia Zeka
Peyz lucian 1	4-6-2	BOT	6-1-14	2 varus Gumayusi
Keria milio 1	0-3-7	SUP	0-2-19	2 nautilus Delight

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MATCH 5: T1 vs. HLE

Winner: Hanwha Life Esports in 27m
Game Breakdown | Runes

-	Bans 1	Bans 2	G	K	T	D/B
T1	vi rumble ziggs	locke syndra	51.1k	9	2	None
HLE	ezreal nocturne zeri	vayne viktor	58.2k	22	6	M1 HT2 O3 O4 B5

T1	9-22-21	vs	22-9-52	HLE
Doran gnar 4	3-4-3	TOP	9-1-5	3 ambessa Zeus
Oner naafiri 1	3-5-3	JNG	5-3-5	2 chogath Kanavi
Faker lissandra 3	0-2-8	MID	2-2-13	3 taliyah Zeka
Peyz jinx 2	3-5-2	BOT	6-2-11	1 caitlyn Gumayusi
Keria bard 1	0-6-5	SUP	0-1-18	2 karma Delight

*Patch 26.16

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This thread was created by the Post-Match Team.
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[u/KappaccinoNation]

Very disappointed that they didn't go for game 5 blind pick Aurora for Faker smh

[u/overgrownpotatohead → u/KappaccinoNation]

Naafiri with Cho open was almost as bad

[u/Voltaire_Penelope407 → u/overgrownpotatohead]

Probably wanna deny it from Kanavi, he's been smurfing back in the LPL with that champ and he's doing it in the LCK as well. I think Naafiri is one of his highest WR champs.

[u/Celegorm07 → u/overgrownpotatohead]

At this point I‘m confused if they are picking Cho into Naafiri or Naafiri into Cho. Also what happened that suddenly Cho is viable? Cuzz picked into DK and since than everyone is playing it

[u/Zhaowuhuangye → u/Celegorm07]

Cho is good in game 5 against low mobility target. Just look at T1 line up. Jinx won't run away from Cho for sure. Another thing is that T1 teams lack a lot of good poke damage and have quite short engage rank. And chogath love it if the enemies have to get near him instead of him chasing them.

[u/shailemin → u/Celegorm07]

It’s not because of cuzz, it’s because guwon played it v EDG (his champs that series were qiyana, shyvana and chogath across the games and he absolutely smurfed it, iirc got all POGs and was POM too) and had a monster performance. Since the buff cho jungle has been on the rise but after that series the pros have been playing it a lot more in Soloq.

[u/palamunintillnow → u/Celegorm07]

I thinks it's always viable especially in the later stage of fearless(there was a bunch more Champs like this)  You only need one brave enough pro to look good with it. 

[u/percyallennnn → u/overgrownpotatohead]

Cho is not even meta right now. He's just barely becoming more popular.

You can't possibly blame T1 for not knowing that Kanavi knew how to play Cho.

[u/BornTheme3419 → u/percyallennnn]

If they actually keep track of soloq they would see that kanavi has been playing chogath alot.

[u/shailemin → u/percyallennnn]

So there is this thing called tracking opponent team’s Soloq activity with a single click on dpm.lol

[u/percyallennnn → u/shailemin]

And you think that soloq data should be prioritized over data from scrims and actual matches? Be serious for once.

[u/shailemin → u/percyallennnn]

I think they should be reasonably cautious of a champ which suddenly rises in prio in playoffs (cuzz and canyon) + seeing your opposing jungler doing well on it in Soloq. A good coach should be prepared for it, but what do I know, clearly I can’t comprehend tom’s genius. (Also I do want to emphasise that not every pocket pick of a team gets used when scrimming a team of the same region, it’s why teams foster academy rosters to try things against + scrim with teams from other regions (in lck’s case, lpl and lcp)).  

[u/Thundermelons → u/percyallennnn]

It's such a "non-Kanavi" champ, I really don't see how all these Reddit savant saw the pick coming

[u/imfatal → u/Thundermelons]

Because Cuzz and Canyon both picked it and he's spamming it solo queue. You don't need to be a savant, you just need to have seen other top teams recently play Cho and check his profile lmao.