Bilibili Gaming End the LPL's Five-Year Wait to Win Worlds 2026

Bilibili Gaming are world champions for the first time. On Saturday night at the Barclays Center in Brooklyn, they beat Gen.G 3-1 in the Worlds 2026 final and returned the Summoner's Cup to the LPL five years after EDward Gaming's title, ending a run of four straight LCK winners.

by Rémi15 Nov 20264 min read

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Photo Credit: Colin Young-Wolff/Riot Games

Gen.G arrived as favourites after sweeping both of their knockout series and took the opening game, before a final fought over Barons and Elder Dragons swung the other way. The second game alone ran to 53 minutes, the longest of the tournament. BLG had already beaten Hanwha Life Esports in the Swiss stage, then Dplus KIA and T1 in the knockouts, so all four LCK representatives fell to the same team on its way to the title.

The 2024 final, two years on

Chen "Bin" Ze-bin, Peng "Xun" Li-xun, Zhuo "Knight" Ding and Luo "ON" Wen-jun were all part of the BLG side that lost the 2024 final to T1 in five games, and that defeat ran through most of their answers in the champions' press conference. Xun, one of BLG's strongest players across the four games, was asked how that night fed into this one.

A step ahead of the LCK

Daeny's confidence in BLG went beyond their individual match-ups. Looking back at the team's preparation for international events throughout the year, the head coach felt they had consistently been ahead of the LCK in their understanding of the game, particularly on the macro side.

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Preparing for international events with my players this year, however I looked at it, I always felt we were well ahead in macro, in our analysis of the patch. I felt the LCK was following us. […] Once the players understood the macro, even if it took them a while, I felt we could reach a level where we played it better.

Daeny via press conference

That confidence in BLG's preparation did not mean Daeny expected his players to execute flawlessly. Their opening loss to Gen.G was a reminder of that. The turning point came at the fourth dragon, where Luo "ON" Wen-jun went in well ahead of his team's call. Daeny said he chose not to raise it again with a player he knew was already blaming himself.

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I often compare what we do to riding a bicycle. You can't ride one unless you accept that you'll scrape your knees. […] Mistakes like that are bound to happen because we're not AI, and we still had games left to play.

Daeny via press conference

Xun and Knight take over

The second game is where the final changed hands. Peng "Xun" Li-xun set the tempo on Naafiri while Zhuo "Knight" Ding found his way into almost every fight, and BLG eventually picked off Jeong "Chovy" Ji-hoon and Kim "Canyon" Geon-bu to take a decisive Baron before closing out after 53 minutes. The third game followed a similar course, with BLG seizing control in the mid game off a rare mistake from Ruler.

Park "Viper" Do-hyeon had an uneven final overall, and those two games were the ones where he made the difference, on Ziggs in the second, where he set the tournament's damage record, and on Taliyah in the third. Ruler said Gen.G had built their drafts around exactly those picks.

BLG had stuck with mage bot laners throughout First Stand and MSI, even as patches made the picks less favourable on paper. Daeny said the team continued to trust them because the solo queue data still supported their value.

Game four, and Knight's final

Ruler opened game four on Xayah, the champion he won Worlds with in 2017, wearing his own championship skin, and Gen.G led early. He said afterwards he had believed that start would carry him through. BLG clawed the game back through Xun's Nocturne and Knight's Twisted Fate, with Chen "Bin" Ze-bin flanking on Gwen and ON landing decisive ultimates on Neeko. Gen.G won one more fight to claim the Chemtech Soul, but BLG answered immediately with Baron and pushed down the mid lane to finish it.

Knight was named Finals MVP and became the first Chinese mid laner to lift the trophy. Asked who he most wanted to thank, he named himself.

Xun, Bin and ON also played in that 2024 final against T1, and it came up in most of their answers. ON said losing both the MSI and Worlds finals that year had left him doubting himself, while Bin, reminded of his post asking how he was supposed to sleep after that defeat, said he did not expect to sleep tonight either. Viper, who won his first Worlds title with EDward Gaming in 2021, had a different kind of journey to this second one. He revealed that the months leading up to the tournament had been particularly difficult, leaving him with a more negative outlook on life.

Gen.G point to the draft

Gen.G's press conference kept coming back to the draft. Chovy said the team had gone in with a framework and strayed from it, while head coach Ryu Sang-wook felt they had failed to secure strong enough side-lane picks for the topside.

Chovy tied those drafts to the way Gen.G then played. He had judged that their compositions would fall behind if games went long, which pushed the team into impatient plays as they chased a bigger lead. Asked about his first Worlds final, he questioned the team's whole approach to the series.

Ruler takes the blame

Ruler was the one Gen.G player to come out of the series with credit, and a Chinese outlet told him fans had rated his final highly. He answered by pointing at the objective fights.

He and Kim "Kiin" Gi-in, the two most experienced players on the roster, both said the group would not be broken by this defeat. Ruler added that he felt sorry for not having led the team enough.

For Gen.G, the loss leaves another Worlds campaign unfinished. For BLG, it closes a chapter that began with the heartbreak of 2024. Two years later, Bin, Xun, Knight and ON finally have the title that slipped through their hands in London. The LPL has its world champions back, and the wait is over.