How it unfolded
Riot staged the Season 3 final at the Staples Center, home arena of an NBA franchise. Tickets for the indoor, 10,000-plus-seat venue sold out, and Riot announced a total tournament viewership of 32 million. The final matched South Korea's SK Telecom T1 against China's Royal Club. Built around Impact, Bengi, Faker, Piglet and PoohManDu, SKT had already been dominant in its domestic league that year and carried the same approach onto the world stage. Jungler Bengi controlled the early game to funnel advantages to mid lane, and 17-year-old Faker converted those advantages into teamfight control. Royal Club tried to create openings through Uzi's individual skill, but never found an entry point against SKT's vision control and objective play, dropping three straight games. Faker became a world champion in his debut year.
Why it still matters
This is the starting point of League of Legends' rise to become esports' biggest title, and the match where the name Faker was stamped into the world's memory. Selling out a final at an arena synonymous with American professional sports gave investors and sponsors concrete evidence of the discipline's scale, and it was the moment Korean-style macro play became the world standard.