JACKSONVILLE, Ill.- Going into week two Illinois College would take on the University of Missouri. The team was hungry for a win and came out the gate swinging, drafting an aggressive composition favoring them against Mizzou.
With a standout performance from
Dalton Swaino in top lane getting an early three kills against top and jungle, the game seemed all but cemented in Illinois College's favor. After a tense dragon fight loss, Illinois College rallied and was able to take game one of the series.
Going into game two, Mizzou looked to learn from their mistakes and properly punish the top side of the map putting Illinois on the back foot. Unable to get a comparable lead on the bot side of the map, Illinois College succumbed to the pressure Mizzou applied forcing a game three.
Going into game three, Illinois College was able to finally enable their jungler,
Tim Blackwell, on his udry. This allowed them to better control the tempo of the game and constantly put them on neutral objectives first. After a back and forth mid-late game where Illinois College was denied drake soul, Illinois College was able to find their perfect engage on the seventh dragon spawn. Through coordination from Swaino,
Sean Corley, and Blackwell crowd controlling the enemy,
Christian Varacalli and
Tony Bautista-Foti were able to deal all the damage needed to score a clean ace. This led Illinois College to their first win in MEC taking their record to 1-1 overall.
The team will take on Purdue University in their next contest on Sunday, 2/14 at 6:30 PM.
