I am not super confident with my call that PSG Talon won’t make it to the Rumble Round because of how dominant they were in their region. What give me a little solace is the fact that the Pacific Championship Series has some really weak teams. PSG Talon is not an overly bloody team and they focus on stretching you around the map rather than fighting over and over again. That being said, they just don’t die in fights and those kills get funneled onto carries really well. This will be an exciting group and they pose a real challenge against the MAD Lions and Istanbul Wildcats. 

Lane Breakdown

In this section I am going to go lane by lane (or position by position) and grade out each player and set some expectations for what we should see from them in the group stage! Obviously playing on stage in an actual tournament can give us some pretty special moments but I will outline what should be the most likely outcome.

Top Lane (Hanabi): On paper, Hanabi looks like he should be a slam dunk for the top lane. While he had an amazing KDA in the regular season (7.0) and playoffs (11.0) you have to take a closer look. Hanabi played safe engage and champions who had relatively low risk in the 1v1. He crutched hard on Gnar and then also Renekton who both shined at the top of the global meta and pair well with a team oriented team comps. Hanabi will be a great super safe pick but in terms of his kill output (59 kills over 27 games) he just doesn’t have quite the same output as other top laners.

Jungle (River): This should be a player you keep on your radar. He dropped 86 kills in the regular season and had a 6.72 KDA. He has a fairly wide range of champions in 2021 (9 total champions) and they range from tank/engage (Volibear and Udyr) to assassin (Nocturne and Nidalee). He isn’t the primary carry on PSG but what he does bring is a lot of aggression in his jungle pathing. He is gank focused and looks to put the bot lane ahead specifically. He has his hands full in this group but if PSG sticks to making their picks around the team identity and not get sucked into the 1v1 I think they can stick around in this group. 

Mid Lane (Maple): This man doesn’t die. In 18 games he died less than 1 time per game and in the playoffs he averaged only 1.67 deaths per game. He also has a wider range of champions he plays from his staple Azir pick which gives PSG a lot of control in the mid lane to more kill focused picks like Akali and Yone who want to take out the enemy carries. They get him the counterpick as often as then can and he usually gets them a pretty good pay off. River can pretty much ignore the mid lane and Maple will be able to take care of himself. 

Bot/AD Carry (Unified): A tale as old as time, a minor region depending on their bot laner to carry in late game teamfights. Unified had 119 kills in the spring split and 114 assists with a 14.6 KDA (yes, FOURTEEN POINT SIX). In Spring regular season he had a 34% team kill share percentage and in playoffs that jumped to almost 39%. I think his Kai’Sa is one of his best champions and I think he can play it on par with the likes of Carzzy and HolyPhoenix. I think if he gets pushed onto something like Senna, we will see him have a much more difficult time carrying PSG. 

Support (Kaiwing): Expect to see nothing but tank engage out of Kaiwing. While a little unfair to throw this on him because they are so much more impactful in this meta, historically he prefers those types of picks over the damage focused mages. What does this mean? You can prepare specifically for his champion pool. I think more creative teams will pick up champions like Morgana who directly counters his champion pool. Teams will focus on keeping this bot lane down so Kaiwing may be the weaker piece to target here.

Cann’s Final Thoughts

I have such a hard time reading this team. I think in a DFS aspect, there are some players you can pick up like River and Unified but I think it will be hard for them to crack into the Rumble round. The 17-1 record looks impressive on paper but there is a huge skill difference between their runner up in the PCS (Beyond Gaming) and the team MAD Lions beat out to be in MSI (G2 Esports). I think this overall quality of opponent and how prepared that makes PSG will make a lot of difference in this matchup.  

Cann’s Record Prediction: 3-3
Cann’s Final Placement Prediction: Round Round Pla