G2 Hel defeated in their Northern LoL Championship Division 2 debut after an almost 50-minute game
In front of a peak audience of 984 viewers, G2 Hel, the female League of Legends team of G2 Esports, were defeated in their Northern LoL Championship Division 2 debut. A hard-fought game ended when amateur team 42 Gaming finally managed to break G2 Hel’s resilience after almost 50 minutes.
G2 Hel have obtained their NLC Division 2 spot by applying for it. After Norwegian org Vanir withdrew, the organizers decided to fill their spot through open applications; G2 Hel was chosen. Last year they competed in the NLC Division 3, finishing 6th out of 10 teams in Group A on both the spring & summer splits.
G2 built a gold lead early and held onto it for about 20 minutes. This included First Blood for Colomblbl’s Nautilus, obtained in the 5th minute on Rexat’s Pyke. 42 Gaming managed to reverse the situation with a pick on Lizia's Rumble during the 22nd minute; they then kept the gold lead for the rest of the game.
On the 33th minute Shiina’s Vi & Sha’s Cassiopeia succesfully caught and killed Influentik's Zed in the botlane. G2 tried to capitalize by going for Baron, but they got neither Baron nor a pick while Colomblbl died in the process.
Following a 1 for 1 trade of Shiina for Chryssey's Hwei in the 35th minute, 42 Gaming got their 4th dragon and the Cloud Soul with it. The first Baron fell in the 40th minute, as 42 Gaming used their area control to prevent G2 Hel’s players from approaching until it was too late. They then got the first Elder Dragon 2 minutes later.
After a pick on Colomblbl, 42 Gaming got their 2nd Baron in the 47th minute. They knocked down G2’s mid & bot inhibitors with a coordinated push in the 48th minute, then Influentik finished off the last one shortly afterwards. With all 3 inhibitors down, 42 Gaming got their second Elder and finished the game in the next push.
I reached out to the 42 Gaming toplaner, Virtuso, for some post-game comments:
Virtuso: “G2 Hel were pretty good. They matched us well in the early game and made it hard to play. But later they overgrouped and tried to 5-man everything, which made it easy for us to play sidelanes in response.
It’s easier to prepare for playing against a team that has been together for so long. We studied videos of G2 Hel’s games from 2023 and adjusted accordingly.
It feels good to win in front of such a big audience; it’s more fun. But 42 Gaming will be a strong team in this league even if people don’t care about us.”
G2 Hel’s next NLC Division 2 game is scheduled for Friday the 2nd of February; they’ll play against Norwegian org Garden Gaming, who defeated Swedish org Karolinerna in Playday 1.
Additional links:
G2 Hel vs 42 Gaming Twitch VoD (Champion Select)
While the game was originally supposed to be streamed on the NLC Twitch channel as well, it was ultimately only streamed on the G2 Esports Twitch channel due to technical issues.
G2 League of Legends’ X (Twitter) account
42 Gaming’s X (Twitter) account
Sources:
G2 Esports Twitch stream stats on sullygnome.com
Unforeseen changes to NLC Division 2 on leagues.gg
Welcome @G2League Hel to the NLC Division 2 by NLC on twitter.com
NLC 3rd Division 2023 Spring on lol.fandom.com
NLC 3rd Division 2023 Summer on lol.fandom.com
G2 Hel Roster Announcement by G2 League of Legends on youtube.com
🚨🚨🚨ROSTER ANNOUNCEMENT🚨🚨🚨 by 42 Gaming on twitter.com
NLC 2nd Division 2024 Spring on lol.fandom.com