On Saturday, the final stretch of the
League of Legends Championship Series (
LCS) season will begin. The eight teams are eager to battle for the Championship and one of the three slots to the 2026 World Championship to be held on home soil.
became the first team since 2019 to win back-to-back splits in the same season, but other contenders and several roster changes made between the end of Spring and the start of Summer could challenge the balance of power established within the league. As the LCS starts the final race en route to the World Championship,
Sheep Esports analyzes the crucial storylines and the stakes each team plays for at hand.
Home region responsibility
The third split of the season carries the most important reward of direct qualification to the 2026 World Championship. The quadrennium tradition dictates that the LCS will host this edition of Worlds, and all eight teams want to carry this responsibility. Two teams have positioned themselves as the favorites to grab the first two slots: the back-to-back champions LYON and the Spring Split runner-up
.
Assuming both teams qualify, LYON would become the first team from Mexico to rep North America at a World Championship, and the first Mexican team to qualify for the Main Stage of Worlds. If TL claim their spot, Argentinean superstar Brandon Joel “
" Villegas would also become the first Latin American player to qualify for the Main Stage at Worlds.
The Cloud9 curse
have established themselves as the third best team in the region, but haven’t been able to break their two concurrent curses: winning a championship and qualifying for fully international competition. They played the inaugural Americas Cup, yet that’s a competition that only includes teams from the American continent.
The offseason between Spring and Summer kept the team extremely busy. The team promoted Christian “
IWillDominate" Rivera to
Head Coach and brought a vast array of Assistant coaches to help the team. C9 also expanded to a seven-man roster, as they
brought back Korean midlaner Lee “
" Sang-min and
promoted Edward “" Ra from NACL. Will this be enough to secure Cloud9 a spot at Worlds, or will their misfortune continue?
Rookies and Veterans are ready to rumble
There are several stories of teams ramping up as the season ends to snag a Worlds spot unexpectedly. Cloud9 found their rhythm at the end of the 2015 season, and 100 Thieves duplicated the same result in 2025.
and
are two teams that could potentially challenge for the last spot at Worlds, and have kept the same core of players this season.
FlyQuest bet on a developmental rookie project as the 2026 season kicked off, but the team has progressed faster than expected. They played Cloud9 for first place in the LCS Lock-In regular season and finished fourth in the Spring Playoffs. If this roster achieves a flow state, their progress could exponentially improve from the experience of playing at Worlds.
The complete opposite of FlyQuest would be Sentinels. Their team relies on veteran presence, Korean mechanics, and the North American soul. Their Head Coach, Greyson “Goldenglue" Gilmer, is the architect of 100 Thieves’ miracle run in 2025. This team has had international experience this season, qualifying for the Americas Cup and the 2026 Esports World Cup. The league has to be wary if the Society finds their groove.
