Week 6 Match Reviews

From here on out, I’m going to only focus on the two matches that are actually happening since Faction died and there’s a bye week going around.

IRENE vs. Galactic Kids Next Door

Map: pl_upward
Predicted: 2-1 IRENE
Result: 2-0 KND
Logs

Coming into this match, I was expecting KND to continue their upswing and put up a good fight against KND. Turns out the upswing’s already been completed and we just didn’t see due to their match last week being against Bv. Their issues that plagued them from weeks 2-4 seemingly vanished, as the entire roster was performing well and put IRENE away in quick fashion. Major shoutouts to SGC for this one; despite being outfragged by bo4r almost every single one of his kills was massive. Whether it be well timed picks onto Skye to prevent her from ubering, mid-uber snipes onto Jarrett securing a win or killing bo4r to open space for his team, he really was the definition of quality over quantity this game. That’s not to say no one else on KND performed; Kresnik and arekk had vintage performances with Etney right behind them, slamming the FROYO combo of habib and b4nny. Bowl didn’t perform to his usual numbers but when the rest of the team is doing so well he doesn’t have to, as the combo was aggressively taking the ground the pick classes were opening up. IRENE looked like they just couldn’t keep up, consistently being a step or two behind KND’s quick pace.

After KND’s first push in the first half went a little longer than expected, the rest of the map vanished in a flash, with consistent kills onto Skye being a trend as she wasn’t able to pop off a single uber after first as KND rolled in a quick 5.5 minutes. The second half saw IRENE open with aggression of their own before SGC and the KND flank slammed the door on IRENE at 3rd, holding them for nearly 6 minutes on the rollercoaster alone. The eventual 10 minute time would prove to be not nearly enough as KND announce their resurgence with an exclamation point.

MVPs: SGC, arekk, Kresnik

Fast Forward vs. Chill Penguins

Map: cp_steel
Predicted: 2-1 >>
Result: 2-1 >>
Logs

I may have missed the prediction on the last match, but I’m happy to say I was right about Bv getting their first round of the season. The first and third rounds weren’t much to speak about, with Bv pushing 10+ min times followed by sub-5 minute times by >>. The second half is where the magic happened, though. After a still-quick 5:30 cap by >>, Bv didn’t let a med drop pushing into B (AND pushing into E) stop them from getting a sub-5 A-B-E on >> led by some unlikely heroes. While getting outfragged on the half overall, a resurrected cas took over for Niko Jims and led the way with 13 frags (most of which were on offense), trailed closely by smitty (12), zoey (12), and Acore (11). I have to imagine cas had a strong presence on E while Bv was pushing allowing him to pick up that many frags, while a key med pick by Acore just as figsy was getting uber opened the door in the first place. Given that the other two rounds were fairly one-sided it’s hard to say this game was necessarily ‘close’, but Bv’s ability to take a round against the team currently ranked first should help cement their decision to play in Invite as a reasonable one. They’ll pick up a FFW against Faction in week 9 to cement a digit in the W column, but a looming week 8 steel match against AD may see Bv make their mark earlier than expected.

MVPs: exile, rain, cas

Week 7 Match Predictions

Nothing overly exciting coming into this week, it would seem. >>/Faction would’ve been a good match were it to be actually played, but as of now it’ll just be a bye for >> before they play the higher-end teams at the end of the season.

Apolodosh vs. Galactic Kids Next Door

Bans: Ashville (AD), Warmtic (KND), Cascade (KND), Lakeside (AD)
Map: koth_product_rc9

There’s one timeline where I predict AD winning this match after KND’s performance last week, and it's the one where KND repeats their earlier mistake of not banning Cascade. Oblivion’s return should shore up a lot of KND’s combo weaknesses, and on a map as standard as Product I doubt anything AD can bring will be something KND hasn’t seen before. The last match between these two teams nearly went in AD’s favor, but on a different map and with their main pyro back I doubt things will be remotely as close. If KND’s able to play like they did last week (especially SGC and Kresnik) all of their bad memories against AD from week 4 should vanish.

Prediction: 4-0 KND
Gamechangers: shaayy, Mad, oblivion

Chill Penguins vs. IRENE

Bans: Lakeside (IRENE), Cascade (Bv), Product (Bv), Ashville (IRENE)
Map: koth_warmtic_b6

We did it! We got a warmtic! With KND/IRENE having played Cascade in week 3, it means we’ll have one shot left in week 10 for vigil for the entire map rotation to have been played at some point. Unfortunately for this match, even with Bv coming in on a bit of a rise and IRENE’s poor showing last week, I don’t think past results nor the map will change the final result. Bv has the opportunity to snag a round if they can exploit Skye like KND did last week while keeping down the froyo boyos, but I question if they have the DM to do that on a map like warmtic.

Prediction: 4-0 IRENE
Gamechangers: zoey, smitty, cas

Power Rankings

1. Kids Next Door (+2)
2. IRENE (-1)
3. Fast Forward (-1)
4. Apolodosh
5. Chill Penguins

Return of the king, baby. KND comes out swinging with one of the quickest wins all season against IRENE, setting them up to be the current strongest team unless AD or >> can unseat them in the coming weeks. With The Faction taking 2 rounds off IRENE two weeks ago, their mortality is definitely confirmed right now, meaning that 2nd spot is still up for >>’s grabs. AD, on the other hand, would need a miraculous run to break out of 4th, given their performance against >> in week 5.