On Sunday, Sept. 16, Cloud9 (C9) went 3-0 against Team SoloMid (TSM) to secure their place at this year’s League of Legends World Championship.

TSM put up quite the fight, but still couldn’t match C9 in any of the three matches played. TSM’s best shot seemed like game one, when they established a good early game lead over C9 and maintained that lead into the mid game. Late game, C9 started making steps back to the top, starting at about 20 minutes into the game.

TSM’s top laner, Kevin “Hauntzer” Yarnell, who was playing Sion at the time, missed his ultimate and was caught behind C9 resulting in his death.

At about 31 minutes in the match, TSM’s support player, Alfonso “Mithy” Rodriguez, was caught out and killed, resulting in the death of two more of TSM’s players. Using the momentum from this play, C9 was able to push into TSM’s base and end the game.

“As soon as I found out that Hecarim was good into Aatrox, I was just like, not worried at all,” Eric “Licorice” Ritchie, C9’s top laner said in an interview aired on Twitch.

Game two went a little differently in the early game with C9 taking an early lead. Robert “Blaber” Huang, scored an early double kill. Later in the match, C9 was able to secure a Baron, but did not make use of it.

As for the second Baron of the game, C9 secured that one as well. They used this one to expose two of TSM’s inhibitors, even destroying one of them. Although TSM was able to stop C9’s first push that was intended to end the game, they were unable to do so a second time.

“Feeling pretty good, even though we lost finals, it was pretty bad, we were able to come back and realize a pretty good amount of our problems, and I’m glad we were able to fix them,” Zachary “Sneaky” Scuderi, C9’s ADC player said in an interview aired on Twitch.

For the final match, C9 decided to play slow and take their time. Attempting to avoid team fights, C9 was constantly rotating throughout the map and taking turrets. Although TSM was able to win a few small altercations, C9 had built up pressure in each lane and had more overall control over the map.

To end the match, C9 took their second baron of the game and used it to shove into TSM’s base to take home the series to secure their spot at Worlds.

“It’s been a rough road, I’m glad you guys have supported us through it,” said Scuderi.

This will be the first ever Worlds that TSM did not qualify for, and C9 is now the record holder for most consecutive Worlds appearances in a row at 6 out of 7. Worlds has been held since 2011.

This year’s Worlds will be held in Korea and will be taking place from Oct. 1 through Nov. 3. It will be available to watch on multiple platforms including Youtube, Twitch, the official League of Legends website, and various other streaming platforms.