Being in last place doesn’t mean being the least skilled, and CLG and Golden Guardians proved that this weekend. In a remarkable show of skill, the two teams ranked the lowest beat the team teams ranked the highest – and it wasn’t even that hard for them. While Cloud9 definitely made CLG work for it, the Guardians hardly looked like it was much effort to beat Echo Fox. Everyone was so transfixed seeing the worst teams dominate the best, that they didn’t even pay attention to Clutch Gaming crushing their competition and moving to the third place slot.

It has been a staple of League of Legends that CLG will pull out a win so long as no one is expecting it from them. From the start, the two teams were trading back and forth on equal footing, and it was through slow picks that C9 started to make progress in the game. But C9, who had previously had better map play than anyone, found themselves up against an unexpected challenge. CLG was fending off C9’s constant attacks, and more than that, they were getting kilsl from them. Every time C9 aggressed, CLG repelled them and took a kill as well. Suddenly, Stixxay was a beast on his fifth, sixth, then seventh kill in a row. Coupled with Licorice on a Maokai – put that guy on a carry, please – and C9 simply couldn’t stand against the more destructive power of CLG.

The very next game, the Golden Guardians beat Echo Fox in a resounding victory. No one would guess that these were the first and ninth place teams by how they played. Contractz in particular played like an absolute monster on Volibear. He may as well have been laning with how much time he spent out of the jungle and hurling his enemies around in lane. Despite Fox drafting intelligently – a Trundle into Cho’Gath and Volibear is a great decision – it wasn’t enough to carry the game. Cho’Gath was too unkillable, and by 15 minutes, the Guardians were already up 4k gold. Although the entire team was playing super aggressive, it was Contractz who led the team in constant ganks.

In the middle of the pack, Team Liquid took a win over 100 Thieves with a snowballing Shen that the Thieves simply couldn’t stop. Xmithie and Impact were particularly cruel to Ssumday, ganking him non-stop and getting Impact hugely ahead, but at the point where your Shen is 1v2ing your mid laner and top laner, you know you have a problem. Unfortunately for TL, that playmaking didn’t work against CLG a game later. Reignover just hard focused on getting Stixxay ahead even as TL abused their top and mid, and once again, Stixxay led them to victory.

The real success story out of this weekend, however, is Clutch Gaming. Two more wins notched into their belt this weekend put them within grasp of first and second place an firmly in third. While everyone was busy expecting Power of Evil to explode, it was Febiven who surged forward. He has been playing truly great, but he has also been backed up by excellent gameplay. The EnVy trinity – LirA, Hakuho, and Apollo – have always been good players, and CG being able to pick them up after EnVy disbanded has helped the team considerably in cohesion and communication. While they haven’t been leading in flashy plays or kills, they have been winning games handily. At the end of the day, even if you’ve got the bluster of Doublelift or the star power of Huni, wins are what matters, and Clutch Gaming is coming up huge.