SK Gaming's first big test of the Summer split ended in a 2-0 loss to G2, leaving the rebuilt German side 1-1 after a mid-lane change and a full reset. RFT.GG caught up with SK Gaming ADC Josip "Jopa" ΔanΔar after the defeat to talk about starting from scratch with SlowQ, learning next to Mikyx as a rookie, adapting to the mage meta, and how high SK can realistically aim.
I'm kinda sad that we didn't win, especially game two β I feel like we had control at a few timers and just weren't really sure what the best plan was. But overall I think we showed some decent fighting, and there's a lot to learn from this series. It kind of sucks, but you've just got to take the takeaways. G2 is a really good team, and we went through a lot of mid-game and late-game sequences against them that we can learn a lot from. Just got to take it and move on.
Since we had a longer off-season, I just took the time to reset β I wasn't playing much League or following what was happening. I used it to come back fresh in the Summer, and we just start from scratch. We made a roster change, the results weren't the greatest, so we just try to start fresh.
Honestly, I don't care much about individual stuff, how I'm doing. I only care whether we're winning as a team or not.
I don't think about Rookie of the Year awards or anything like that. I just want to get some wins and reach playoffs β that's what I'm aiming for. I want to see how it feels, I want to play best-of-fives. Those are my ambitions right now.
At the beginning I did feel pressure. Every time we played, it's not that he was judging me, but I felt judged β like, "yeah, the rookie playing with Mikyx." But we played a lot of games, talked a lot, reviewed the 2v2s, how the lane went. He helped me a lot in lane, seeing things, explaining what I should be doing. And just playing with him, getting to know him β we're just bros, so we're working together. So I don't feel pressured or anything now.
Throughout my career I've been pretty comfortable playing some off-meta things and some mages, so I don't care much whether I'm on a mage or a different champion. It's more about how we play around it as a team and what we do with it β that's where I need to be more vocal, and where we need to get a bit better as a team. Honestly, in solo queue right now I'm mostly practising these new picks, these new mages, because I have hundreds of Corki games β I don't think I need to play a Corki game every day to be ready β or Yunara, or whatever I played yesterday, I don't even remember. But I'm always ready to play both sides.
As a team we're working on understanding the timers β where the support should be, where the jungle should be, when they should be together or split, how we want to play the map. Mages are usually fine being left alone on the bot lane, just playing 1v1s. It's been going pretty good so far. I can feel the progress slowly, the more we play, and that feels really good and gives you confidence.
In the splits with LIDER β we were testing a lot of playstyles, experimenting with what worked for us, and not a lot was working. We were just a bit lost. And this could be on anyone, honestly β I think all five players were really bad by the end, I won't lie. But SlowQ did bring a bit more stability. He plays more mages, so there aren't as many timers where you have to be mid β with melee mids you need to be mid on good timers and play them well, and sometimes you miss those timers or don't play them well. So the game is just a bit slower. There's also a different meta, so it's a bit hard to say, but I think SlowQ brought some stability.
We had a so-called bootcamp before the Summer split. Since it was a five-man roster with LIDER and we didn't get the greatest results, we made the roster change, so we kind of had to start from zero, from scratch. We went through the basics all over again together. Honestly, we were kind of not so good at the beginning β we were losing to ERL teams and things like that. But you could feel it scaling up, the scrims getting better. Now we're beating LEC teams β even winning the series against GIANTX β and
I can see a clear progression as a team. Everyone is feeling it, everyone is motivated again, and it feels nice.
All the teams are kind of all over the place. There are obviously a few top teams, but the rest β everyone is all over the place, and we need to see how people scale into the split.
For me at least, it's about making playoffs first, then going step by step.
There is a possibility to reach it, and if we do, I'll be extremely happy.
