Top Esports Reverse-Sweep BLG as Karmine Corp Knock Out CFO

Top Esports came back from a game down to beat Bilibili Gaming 2-1 on Thursday, October 29, and secured a place in the Worlds 2026 quarterfinals. Earlier the same day, Karmine Corp beat CTBC Flying Oyster 2-0 in an elimination series, ending the tournament for CFO. Both results were reported by Strafe and by the esports news outlet RG on October 30.

The two series were played in Allen, Texas, in the Swiss Stage, the opening phase of the League of Legends World Championship. They changed the standings in different ways. One team is through, one is out, and two more, Bilibili Gaming and Karmine Corp, now share the same record and the same last chance.

Results and records as reported by Strafe, RG and EarlyGame on October 30, 2026.

What was at stake in Round 4

The Swiss Stage works differently from a bracket. Teams play in rounds and are matched against opponents with the same win-loss record. According to Strafe's guide to Round 4, published on October 26, the round ran from October 28 to October 30 at the Credit Union of Texas Event Center in Allen, in six best-of-three series, meaning the first side to win two games takes the series.

The guide put the first two series on Wednesday, October 28: Movistar KOI against T1 at 1:00 p.m. Pacific time and LYON against Invictus Gaming at 4:00 p.m., both between teams at 2-1. It set out two different kinds of series. A team at 2-1 that wins reaches 3-1 and moves on to the quarterfinals; a team at 2-1 that loses drops to 2-2 and plays again in Round 5. A team at 1-2 plays an elimination series: the loser finishes with three defeats and is out, and the winner moves to 2-2 and joins Round 5 on October 31, where the last three playoff places are decided.

That is why October 29 held two very different series. Top Esports and Bilibili Gaming (BLG) both arrived at 2-1. The winner would move on at 3-1, and the loser would drop to 2-2 without being eliminated. Karmine Corp (KC) and CTBC Flying Oyster (CFO) both arrived at 1-2, so one of them would see its tournament end. Strafe's schedule put the CFO and KC series at 1:00 p.m. Pacific time and the BLG and Top Esports series at 4:00 p.m.

How the four teams reached Round 4

Strafe's recaps of the first rounds show how each team ended up in its spot. In Round 1, on October 23, Karmine Corp beat Anyone's Legend and CTBC Flying Oyster beat Team Liquid, while Hanwha Life Esports beat Top Esports and Movistar KOI beat BLG. Strafe noted that all four LPL teams, the Chinese league's representatives, lost their openers, and called it the first time since the Swiss Stage was introduced in 2023 that all Chinese representatives lost their opening matches. Strafe's separate October 23 report added that all four LPL teams had entered the Swiss Stage directly, without the Play-In Stage, and the recap noted that Karmine Corp had come through the Play-In Stage. In the other Round 1 series, Gen.G beat Invictus Gaming, Dplus KIA beat G2 Esports, T1 beat LOS and LYON beat Team Secret Whales, and Strafe's recap headline described the day as a 4-0 sweep for the Korean league, the LCK.

Round 2 followed on October 24. Top Esports beat Anyone's Legend and BLG beat Team Liquid, which put both on 1-1 and then, after Round 3, on 2-1. Karmine Corp lost to LYON, and CFO lost to Movistar KOI. In the other Round 2 series, according to Strafe's recap published October 25, Dplus KIA beat T1, Gen.G beat Hanwha Life Esports, G2 Esports beat LOS and Invictus Gaming beat Team Secret Whales.

Round 3 sorted the field again. According to Strafe's Day 4 report, T1 beat CFO and BLG beat KC, each in a single game, which left CFO and KC at 1-2. Strafe's October 30 report adds that Top Esports then beat G2 Esports. EarlyGame, in a report published on October 27, listed six teams at 2-1 and six at 1-2 going into Round 4, with Gen.G and Dplus KIA already qualified and Anyone's Legend and Team Secret Whales eliminated.

Top Esports turn the series around

BLG, the reigning LPL runners-up according to RG, had beaten Top Esports 2-0 in their previous meeting, in LPL Split 3. Both teams had lost their openers, according to Strafe, and both then won in Round 2.

Top Esports also arrived with a change. Starting top laner Cheng "ZUIAN" Zi-Hao could not travel to the United States because of visa issues, Strafe and RG reported. Bai "369" Jia-Hao took his place. Both outlets say 369 had not played an official match since April.

Game one went to BLG. RG reported a win in about 28 minutes with a 21-6 kill score. EarlyGame said that Zhuo "knight" Ding commanded game one on Orianna and kept setting the pace early in game two on LeBlanc.

Top Esports then won the next two games. Game two ran 38 minutes, and RG said Top Esports took the only Baron Nashor, a major neutral objective, in it. EarlyGame said that Yu "JackeyLove" Wen-bo carried Top Esports through the late teamfights.

Game three went the other way. RG reported a win in about 28 minutes by a 17-3 kill score, a clear reversal of game one. EarlyGame credited the jungle pathing of Gao "Tian" Tian-Liang for the result.

Karmine Corp survive an elimination series

Karmine Corp entered the day at 1-2 after beating Anyone's Legend in Round 1 and then losing to LYON and BLG, as Strafe's round reports and EarlyGame show. CFO had beaten Team Liquid in Round 1 and then lost to Movistar KOI and T1.

Game one was short. Strafe and RG reported that KC won in 27 minutes and 35 seconds with a 19-3 kill score, and the second game decided the day.

Game two did not run in a straight line, and it held a long stoppage. Strafe reported that CFO built a lead of roughly 4,500 gold and secured Dragon Soul, the team-wide advantage earned from taking dragons, but could not convert the advantage into a win. KC closed the gap in teamfights, took Baron Nashor and finished the comeback after a fight around the Elder Dragon, the powerful late-game dragon.

RG reported that play stopped at about the 25-minute mark when CFO reported a possible equipment problem. Strafe relayed Chinese-language reports of five pauses in the game, one lasting nearly half an hour. Those reports mentioned a possible bug preventing item purchases, and Strafe added that this had not been independently confirmed as the cause. EarlyGame described the game as disrupted by bugs, technical problems and remakes.

KC top laner Kim "Canna" Chang-dong told Inven Global, as quoted by Strafe, that the delay was longer than the team expected. He said that Riot Games allowed his team to discuss the game during the stoppage, so getting back into focus when play resumed was not a big problem. EarlyGame added that KC's Caliste was deathless across the series.

What the results changed

The Swiss Stage fills the quarterfinals through its five rounds. After October 29, RG listed the teams already through as Top Esports, Gen.G, Dplus KIA, T1 and Invictus Gaming, with T1 and Invictus Gaming having come through their Round 4 series, which Strafe's schedule placed on October 28. RG and Strafe both say that the remaining three places will be decided in the final Swiss round on Saturday, October 31. Those five teams plus the three places still open make eight quarterfinalists.

For BLG the arithmetic is simple. At 2-2, they have one series left, and RG says it is played in Allen. EarlyGame described BLG as down to their final life. For Karmine Corp, EarlyGame described the run as their first ever at the Worlds Main Event.

CFO finished the Swiss Stage at 1-3. Anyone's Legend and Team Secret Whales were already out after going 0-3, according to Strafe, and Strafe described Anyone's Legend as the LPL's top seed and the LPL Split 3 champion.

What comes next

Two more 1-2 series were still to be played on Friday, October 30: Team Liquid against LOS at 4:00 p.m. Eastern time, and Hanwha Life Esports against G2 Esports at 7:00 p.m. Eastern time, according to Strafe. The winners reach 2-2 and the losers are eliminated.

Together with the two teams that lost their 2-1 series on October 28, those winners join BLG and KC in the 2-2 group. That adds up to six teams at 2-2 competing for the last three places, going by Strafe's schedule and RG's list of qualifiers. The final round of the Swiss Stage is on October 31.

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