Cloud9 has punched its ticket to the finals of the 2021 League of Legends Championship Series Mid-Season Showdown after a 3-1 victory over Team Liquid. C9 shook off an 0-2 head-to-head against TL in the 2021 LCS Spring Split and looked like the better team throughout the series in multiple facets, and stands alone as the only undefeated team in the post-season. 

Because of TL's success against C9 in the Spring Split and the 3-2 epic victory TL had over C9 in the finals of the 2021 LCS Lock In, the series was expected to be contentious. However, Cloud9 showed how much it has elevated its game for the post-season despite a 1st place finish in the Spring Split. 

C9 dominated the early game of game 1, and while the game took longer to finish than the early advantage indicated, the first nexus was still shattered as part of a convincing C9 win. In game 2, Team Liquid outdrafted Cloud9, the latter of whom had gotten a strong composition for itself objectively, but not one that could shutdown TL star top laner Barney "Alphari Morris" as it had in game 1. 

With the series tied, C9 and TL both went to a more standard type of composition focused around scaling carries, and despite being focused early with many ganks from TL, C9 mid laner Luka "Perkz" Perković had arguably his best performance in North America. Perkz shook off a rough early game on Ryze to carry the entire game for C9 and his dominance was best exemplified by an incredible Quadra Kill after his Ryze had been allowed to scale. 

In game 4, C9 had a far less dimensional draft than TL that essentially needed Perkz to carry the game on Lucian, and after a pre-two minute First Blood on Team Liquid mid laner Nicolaj "Jensen" Jensen, that's exactly what happened. C9 built a comfortable lead for the first 25 minutes of the game before hitting the gas and ending the game just two minutes later to decide the series. 

Cloud9 will now head to the finals of the 2021 LCS Mid-Season Showdown, but there are a few other things that need to be taken care of before its opponent is decided. First, TSM and 100 Thieves will face off tomorrow. The loser will be eliminated, and the winner will play against Team Liquid to see who joins C9 in the finals.