Telecom Wars
The second round of the '14-15 SK Telecom Proleague is now behind us, and four teams have been eliminated from contention. Remaining alive are, in order of seeding:
- CJ Entus (6-1), rampaging through Round 2 with seldom seen ferocity.
- Jin Air Green Wings (6-1), finishing the round robin with a 3-0 sweep of CJ Entus.
- SK Telecom (5-2), led by soO and Classic.
- KT Rolster(4-3), limping along through the round with no truly reliable player to speak of.
The first match of the round playoffs pits SK Telecom against KT Rolster in a repeat of last season's finals. Both teams have gone through changes since then and have very different sets of strenghts than they did then, but things appear to be leaning in SKT's favor today just as they were when they played for the championship. KT's newest acquisition Life could either make or break KT's run. Who will move on to face Jin Air Green Wings on Tuesday?
[E/N: A full recap of Round 2 will be forthcoming after the conclusion of the Round 2 playoffs.]


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09:30 GMT (+00:00)
Preview: SK Telecom(#3) vs KT Rolster(#4)
by Zealously
The Telecom derbies are always special. Even though we have grown accustomed to watching them square off for championships and round victories instead of in matches that decide what team will be the round's measly fourth, the excitement the match-up invokes feels almost undiminished.
In stark contrast to the Round 1 playoffs – in which KT did not even participate due to their limping start to the round – the Telecoms now meet as equals. Their match scores, 5-2 for SKT and 4-3 for KT, are separated by the thinnest of margins. Both teams' win/loss differentials are +6 and their game scores – 16-10 – are identical. Interestingly, the match that decided seeding for this match was their round robin match in Week 3 of the round, where SKT walked out the victors after a clean 3-0 sweep. That fact – that SKT managed to not only beat KT but absolutely dominate their rival team – could be the first sign of a paradigm shift. The Telecom rivalry has been in KT Rolster's court for a long time, will this match be the one that really turns the tide?
The Telecoms spent much of last season in a state of veritable roster stasis. After all, what else did they really need to do? SKT's roster was so stacked with star players that the very notion of experimentation was foreign to them. After all, to field Parting instead of Rain or Soulkey instead of soO could hardly be referred to as experimentation, and it's reasonable to say that they grew periodically complacent to a point where they performed below the level they should have been able to maintain. By contrast, KT's thin-but-reliable roster essentially crawled through parts of the season to eventually arrive at the site of their triumph.
This season and particularly this round has changed the two teams. First, let's take a look at KT's roster and the performances of their players this round:
![[image loading]](/staff/Zealously/KTNow.jpg)


- He performs well enough in practice that a starter position is warranted
- A starter position is the position where fielding Flash causes the least potential harm to KT.

Having put


On the other side, a thinned out, revitalized and drastically different SK Telecom:
![[image loading]](/staff/Zealously/SKTNow.jpg)
Although they were fielded only rarely during SKT's run to the finals last season,


This highlights SKT's primary strength. Unlike KT, who essentially rely on most if not all of their key players performing as necessary, SKT seem to have a greater margin of error.

On the topic of integral parts, one cannot talk about SKT without mentioning


Overall thoughts and prediction
There are many factors that might come to decide how this match ends. Neither team is renowned for always making picks that make sense when in a pinch, and fielding the wrong player at the wrong time can and most likely will cause irreparable damage to the team's playoffs effort. Life and Dream respectively are the players I believe will be the most important contributors in this match. If either is taken out before they can perform the function they need to fill, the other team walks out the victor. And right now, that task seems much simpler for SK Telecom than for KT Rolster.
Finally, I cannot conclude this article without mentioning

Zealously: SKT 4-3 KT
banjoetheredskin: SKT 4-1 KT
Destructicon: SKT 4-0 KT
The_Templar: SKT 2-4 KT
![[image loading]](http://www.teamliquid.net/staff/HawaiianPig/SPL/SPLstaricon.png)