After celebrating the Chinese New Year, the League of Legends Pro League was back in session for Week 4 of the LPL 2022 spring split over the past few days. With every team refreshed and ready to rock, the top teams remained on top and a couple of new faces joined from the middle of the pack. Here are the lessons we learned from Week 4 of the LPL 2022 spring split.
V5 are at least a playoff team
The early story of the LPL 2022 spring split so far is the emergence of Victory Five. The perennial bottom dwellers decided it was time to compete during the offseason. They completely retooled their roster with a ton of veteran talent. Notable names that were picked up were Hung “Karsa” Hau-Hsuan Lee “Rich” Jae-won and former world champion, Song “Rookie” Eui-jin . With a roster built to win now, V5 have lived up to their name after a clean Week 4 as they have acquired five victories.
Although they didn’t play any top team in Week 4, V5 still pulled out a scrappy 2-0 week with back-to-back Game 3 scenarios against Oh My God! and Invictus Gaming. V5 hasn’t had the cleanest wins but with shades of last year’s Rare Atom squad, V5 is getting it done. Their 11-7 game record doesn’t matter because standings and placement are based on series record and V5’s is 5-1. The now-fourth place V5 team is finally going to get tested in Week 5 as they square off against Royale Never Give Up. But no matter what happens from here on out, V5 have a good chance at making the playoffs, which is already a win after their 0-16 LPL 2021 summer split.
The LPL is starting to form a big gap between the good and bad
The LPL is a 17-team league. By being the largest league in professional League of Legends, the LPL is bound to have some very good teams and some very bad teams. However, with a league this large, it’s possible to have two distinct factions, the good and the bad. Some leagues have a middle section in their hierarchy reserved for teams that could be playoff contenders below the upper echelon. But in the LPL, that is starting to disappear as the gap between the top and bottom is becoming large.
Heading into Week 4 of the LPL spring split, the gap between the fourth-place team at the time, Weibo Gaming, and the 11th place team was a single game. After Week 4, the gap has already widened to three games. There are currently five teams in the LPL with records of 5-1 or better. While there is still a middle section for now, due to some teams playing more than others so far, the gap between ninth and 10th place is a full game, which was the same gap from fourth to 10th just a week ago.
Xiaohu is making his case for MVP
Royal Never Give Up had an incredible 2021 season which included a Mid-Season Invitational win. RNG’s success was widely due to how well Li “Xiaohu” Yuan-Hao stepped up in his first year as a top laner. But when RNG acquired Chen “Bin” Ze-Bin in the offseason, Xiaohu was finally freed from his prison in the top lane. Now back in his comfort role, Xiaohu put the league on notice. Now at the end of Week 4, the league has noticed him.
RNG had only one match in Week 4, which was against Top Esports. TES is led by reigning second-team All-LPL mid laner, Zhuo “knight” Ding. Knight had the most player of the game honors during the summer split with 14. Xiaohu made knight look like a pawn in their Week 4 matchup. With a combined 12/1/19 Kills/Deaths/Assists across both games, RNG made quick work of TES. Xiaohu took home both player of the game honors which is impressive knowing who he went up against.
Of course with his performance, he was named to the weekly all-LPL team and now sits alone at the top in player of the game honors with six. Not only is RNG already back in peak form, but Xiaohu is too.
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