DRX wins Worlds 2022, Deft's last dance is victorious
The grand finals are over and the one true victor stands above all the fallen teams, as DragonX wins Worlds 2022.
This year’s finals were a hard-fought battle between historical titan T1 and the miracle run underdog of DragonX. Both teams had incredible stories heading into their finals appearance, but it was DRX that took home the Summoner’s Cup in the last five-game series of the year. The Unkillable Demon King has been slain once more, and DRX reign as upset champions.
T1’s journey to Worlds 2022 finals
On one side of the match was the most decorated organization in League of Legends esports history, T1. The South Korean organization has cemented itself as the greatest League of Legends dynasty to exist, thanks to the Unkillable Demon King at the head of their roster Lee “Faker” Sang-hyeok. This year’s iteration of T1 has seen a roster of younger talents step up to join Faker on the game’s biggest stage. Choi “Zeus” Woo-je and Lee “Gumayusi” Min-hyeong have stepped forwards as world-class threats, supported by jungler Mun “Oner” Hyeon-jun and support Ryu “Keria” Min-seok, who have played immaculately to enable the three primary carries on T1.
DragonX’s journey to Worlds 2022 finals
On the other side, opposite T1, stood the underdogs worthy of a sports film, DragonX. The first-ever team to make it all the way from the Play-In stage to the grand finals. At the head of their effort was legendary AD carry Kim “Deft’ Hyuk-kyu, who finally broke his curse of eight years of failing to make it past the quarterfinals. He was supported by the only world champion on the stage apart from Faker, Kim “BeryL” Tae-yoon. With a historic break-out performance by rookie mid-laner Kim “Zeka” Geon-woo, DRX soared past the world’s expectations with a heartwarming tale of triumph against adversity. The squad’s win is one of the greatest unexpected victories in League of Legends history.
DragonX wins Worlds 2022 3-2
The series was a hard-fought battle between the two top Korean teams, with the titanic storylines of this year’s Worlds coming to a fitting conclusion at San Francisco’s Chase Center. Game 1 was a commanding win for favorites T1, with heartbreaking dragon steals and Rift Herald denials keeping DRX on the back foot until Faker and his teammates slammed the door on the first game.
The second game was looking to go the same way, but a masterful performance by DragonX against T1’s poke composition saw them fight back piece by piece at objectives. Eventually DRX flanked at the dragon pit, forcing the issue with an incredibly quick ending sequence over T1. On the Korean stream, DRX’s comms revealed Zeka saying the team couldn’t end, while BeryL, bloodthirsty from his Heimerdinger rampage, urges them onwards.
The third game brought the first proper tanks either team had drafted all season, with much more traditional front-to-back compositions than the first two games with damage-heavy profiles on both sides. T1 and DRX fought back and forth, with DRX managing to find key fights as T1 took an early dragon lead. However, a miracle Baron steal by Oner led to T1 swinging the game in their favor, followed by yet another miracle Baron steal with Oner dead by Gumayusi, and that was simply too much for DRX to come back from. In the blink of an eye, T1 took game three.
But DragonX refused to sit back and lose, crushing T1 around a Rift Herald fight that T1 over-committed to and still lost cracked the game and map open in DRX’s favor. 20 minutes, DRX were up a staggering 5,000 gold and halfway to a Mountain dragon soul. Fight after fight swung in DragonX’s advantage as they battled tooth and nail to keep its championship hopes alive. At 27 minutes, DRX commits to a push to end the entire game with a massive gold lead. T1 fought valiantly but it was simply not enough. DRX struck back at Worlds 2022 and went to Silver Scrapes.
With only the Blue side of the draft having claimed victory throughout the series, T1 seemed slightly favored to take home game five. DRX began with a twist in the draft stage, letting Gumayusi’s famous Caitlyn through the ban phase before picking it up for themselves. T1 responded early, forcing Pyosik from his blue-side jungle at level one, but the game rapidly became neck and neck. Despite T1 edging ahead, DRX found a massive flank in mid lane that opened up the map for a 20-minute Baron Nashor that was suddenly and miraculously stolen, for the second time in the series, by Gumayusi.
T1 proceeded to relentlessly push DRX back, ripping from them every advantage they had earned with the fight until T1 is 1,000 gold ahead and its back to a white-knuckle stalemate with a slight advantage to Faker’s side. T1 decides to try and race DRX to end the game by teleporting to their base as the Mountain soul-wielding DRX crushes the desperate T1. DRX runs through T1’s base and ends the game.
Who won Worlds 2022?
The winner of Worlds 2022 was DragonX, an upset victor after beginning the tournament as Korea’s lowest seed. A miracle run for the ages, from Deft breaking his curse to Zeka’s all-time debut, there may never be a story of a world champion as unexpected as DRX’s Worlds 2022 win. Worlds 2022 will go down as LoL’s greatest underdog story of all time.
DragonX
This is the roster of Worlds 2022 champions, DragonX.
Top Laner: Hwang “Kingen” Seong-hoon
Jungler: Hong “Pyosik” Chang-hyeon
Mid Laner: Kim “Zeka” Geon-woo
Marksman: Kim “Deft” Hyuk-ky
Support: Cho “Beryl” Geon-hee
T1
The runner-ups of Worlds 2022 are T1’s roster, as follows:
Top Laner: Choi “Zeus” Woo-je
Jungler: Mun “Oner” Hyeon-jun
Mid Laner: Lee “Faker” Sang-hyeok
Marksman: Lee “Gumayusi” Min-hyeong
Support: Ryu “Keria” Min-seok
Nicholas James is a gaming writer with a passion for all things geekdom, as well as live theater. Nicholas is best known for covering League of Legends and other top MOBA titles, but his expertise covers numerous games across multiple genres. When not watching the LCS or playing the latest new release, Nicholas can be found doing some tabletop gaming and painting his favorite miniatures. Nicholas has also published with Hotspawn, TheGamer, Dexerto, Esports.gg and other industry outlets.
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