Deft and DRX Is Ready To Take On Faker and T1 in Worlds 2022 Finals

The Worlds Finals will see T1 face off against DRX on November 5.

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In every sport around the world, stories have always been a big part of big games. League of Legends esports, and its fans, especially enjoy using narratives during their tournaments. And Worlds 2022 is probably the richest one so far.

Despite many analysts and fans predicting a strong showing for LPL, this year’s Worlds stage was dominated by LCK. Korea managed to put three teams into the Semifinals stage two years in a row now, and two teams into the Finals this year. This will be the first LCK vs. LCK finals since 2017’s Samsung Galaxy victory, which prompted many fans to jokingly refer to Worlds as “LCK Autumn.”

There are many storylines that can be talked about ahead of this Finals matchup. Such as how this is the first time a Play-In team made the Worlds Finals, as well as the first time for a 4th seed team. DRX can also be the first Play-In team to win it all. If they can manage to get past the big boss.

Faker is looking for his fourth Worlds trophy

It isn’t controversial to claim Lee “Faker” Sang-hyeok is the best player in LoL history. He is also the player with the most World Championship titles, tied with his long-time jungler Bae “Bengi” Seong-woong. Even though he doesn’t necessarily need it for his resume, a win here would make him hold that record solo. But not the end of the world for Bengi himself, as he currently is the head coach of T1, and he has the chance to be the first person to ever win Worlds both as a player and as a coach.

This also puts Faker’s career into perspective. His old jungler is his coach now, and he still has enough longevity to play on the same stage, surrounded by a completely different group of players. It is hard to grasp how young this new T1 team is. Choi “Zeus” Woo-je was ten years old when Faker won his first Worlds in 2013, and now he is firmly on his way to becoming the next star of T1. The young prodigy played his first full season in 2022, and he is already considered one of the best top laners in the World.

Another big part of T1’s current success, and probably a big part of any future successes as well, is the bot lane duo of Lee “Gumayusi” Min-hyeong and Ryu “Keria” Min-seok. After their undefeated LCK Spring 2022 and before the MSI 2022, this duo was regarded as the best in the world. Unfortunately, they fell short during MSI and slumped heavily during the Summer Split. So it was reassuring to see them get back into form and just dominate. While he still missteps from time to time, Gumayusi is back to his aggressive self and he has been the best ADC in the event. And Keria is slowly turning back time to Spring, where he was not only the best support in the world but overall the best player.

Can DRX complete the biggest underdog story in Worlds history?

If you’ve been around LoL Twitter or in r/leagueoflegends in the last week, you’ve probably seen some posts about how this year’s Worlds played out like an anime story. Kim “Deft” Hyuk-kyu came into the tournament with the probability of retiring at the end of it. Many of the official Riot videos even focused on this being his “last dance.” But against all odds, even when he was at his lowest moment, Deft always found a way back up and eventually made it to his first Worlds Finals, just to face the GOAT of the sport.

Of course, he didn’t accomplish all this alone. His jungler, Hong “Pyosik” Chang-hyeon, was criticized heavily during LCK regular season, he was even subbed out during the early stages of Worlds. But he massively stepped up during the Knockout Stages, especially on his namesake champion Kindred. Deft’s lane partner, Cho “BeryL” Geon-hee, was another player who often got overlooked. If you’re not following League that closely, it may surprise you to hear this will be BeryL’s third straight Worlds Finals appearance, a first for a non-T1 player.

Then there are the solo laners of DRX, Hwang “Kingen” Seong-hoon and Kim “Zeka” Geon-woo. These two are great friends, Kingen was a big reason why the latter decided to join DRX in the first place. And Zeka. His tournament performance is the most impressive first outing for any player in Worlds history, probably since Yu “JackeyLove” Wen-Bo or Faker himself. It’s not surprising why so many fans are rooting for DRX even against Faker and T1.

Worlds 2022 Grand Finals

The Finals for Worlds 2022 will be played on November 5. The show will start with the World Championship Opening Ceremony, which will kick off the Finals at 5 pm PST (2 AM CET). Viewers can watch the ceremony live on loleports.com, LoL Esports Youtube channel and Riot Games Twitch channel, or they can watch it via Riot-partnered co-streams:

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