Plain ol' Granary
We arrive at the penultimate week of ESEA Invite Season 18. LAN has pretty much all been decided, with Froyotech, Mad Men, eLevate TF2, and Street Hoops eSports locking up their spots and will head down to Dallas for S18 LAN. But there are still some extremely important games coming up, mainly for the boys on Froyotech. In other Invite / TF2-related news, the Yomies changed their name to Rat Squad, which is...questionable at best? FITES LAN is also coming up this weekend, so if you're not doing anything you should totally tune in. There's a long list of awesome people going and should be plenty of good TF2 fun.
Locking up Last Week
By Alkaline
- eLevate TF2: 5, A New Yomie: 3 // [Stats]
As expected, eLevate took this match, but the margin was much closer than expected. This can probably be attributed to two things: the first is that the Yomies’ backup MarmadukeGRYLLS was playing roamer instead of Rekuso. Although Rekuso is a great roamer and has performed well for the Yomies, Marmaduke has many seasons of invite experience and so I expect he boosted the Yomies’ performance on the whole. Then, there is the Sunshine factor, which we will be hearing about more in the rest of the recaps. Teams haven’t quite yet gotten used to Sunshine, and when neither team is totally comfortable with a map, it tends to favor the weaker team. Overall, a solid showing from the Yomies, but eLevate is the better team and they showed it.
In our Match of the Week write-ups last week, Tery and I got this one wrong, plain and simple. Looking at the stats, it looks as if Pharaoh was simply having a bad night; as Squid helpfully pointed out in the match comms, he bottom damaged in the server. Speaking of Squid, he had a fantastic match, putting up 41 frags against just 13 deaths. Although Harbleu as expected came in force for Nice Nice Nice, it just wasn’t enough to make up for an underperforming demo. Nice Nice Nice took the match confidently, 5-3.
- Street Hoops eSports: 5, Ding Dong Daddy: 0 // [Stats]
Street Hoops won this match decisively and convincingly. Although it was a bit disappointing to not see the Daddies put up a closer fight after close matches with 4g and Mad Men in the first half of the season, it is worth nothing that due to Sneaky’s absence Alec was on roamer while newly acquired backup Chingoo stepped in on scout. It’s never helpful to be playing with even a slightly different lineup, especially on a newer map where teams are still working figuring out how to best hold and push out. As far as players in this match go, it would be criminal to leave out Cyzer’s epic baiting of his own team which gave him 18 frags to just 1 death! This is while Ninjanick died 4 times. Hmmm…
After Nice Nice Nice’s great upset over Mad Men, hopes were high that they could keep their momentum and give us a close match vs. Street Hoops the next day. Sadly, 20b was playing excellently and Nice Nice Nice struggled to really gain a foothold in the match. The closest they got was a good win on mid in the third round, but they weren’t able to close out their advantage. Given 20b’s decisive win over the Daddies, I am of the opinion that Nice Nice Nice weren’t playing badly; rather 20b was playing extremely well. No player on either team really stood out from the stats, but the overall frag count tells the story of this match perfectly: 34 frags for Nice Nice Nice against 73 for 20b. Ouch.
- Ding Dong Daddy: 0, eLevate TF2: 5 // [Stats]
Daddies was still playing with Alec on roamer for this match, and this really cost them. This was a very lopsided match, with Shrugger (the player with the most deaths on eLevate) still having fewer deaths than any player on the Daddies. It was good to see eLevate take this match decisively after their close (too close?) match against the Yomies. Unsurprisingly for those familiar with eLevate, Bdonski was the MVP of this match, putting out a spectacular 345 DPM (almost 3 times as much as Cosa at 130!).
The LAN Preview Preview
If Froyotech was to falter in their season and lose the perfect season, it would probably be this week. Not only is Granary a map notorious for extremely quick rounds, but the lineup this week features Street Hoops and eLevate, the returning LAN rivals will try everything they can to stop b4nny and friends this week. But can it be done? As far as I remember, b4nny's teams have historically been solid on Granary. Between the sheer fragging power or their Soldiers, the survivability of shade, and everything inbetween. Taking a look back in time reminds us that the S14 HRG shut down Tri Hards and few can forget the S11 Quantic which destroyed Mihaly's Flow's perfect season. Could the reverse possibly happen?
This match is essentially the one we never got to see on LAN. While both teams did meet earlier in the season, it wasn't on a 5CP map. Here's where the hard work and roster stability of 20b could pay off if they're on their A-game. Comparing the rosters, I would give an edge to 4G. Clckwrk and b4nny over paragon and cyzer, lansky and blaze over grape and ash (if only by a little). Deadbolt vs. duwatna is a matchup that will serve a lot of purpose on the midfights, as getting an early stick or even frag onto the enemy Demo can mean quite a lot for your team's midfight. Shade is still in a class of his own for Medic this season. While he doesn't have many frags he also averages very few deaths per game, which is a testament to how strong 4G has been this entire season. Never count out Street Hoops, though. Way back at the beginning of the season they believed they were the #2 team going into this season and here is where they can prove it. If they can grab a win (even just securing more rounds than eLv following) 20b can back up their claim. As for my guess, time and time again, I'm always down to see the underdogs win. Hell, last night was quite the spectacle with both the then-#1 / undefeated teams in Open and IM falling 5-4 to their opponents. Buuut this is Froyotech. They are the Invite juggernauts and I think they'll be too strong on a map favoring Soldiers even though grape and ash will be just as good. Perhaps this is just a prediction where I don't really know who to vote for so I'm going with instinct on this. The game will be close, but maybe not quite the score.
Prediction: 5-1, Froyotech
By Alkaline
At this point, I think we can safely describe eLevate vs. Froyotech as a classic matchup. Froyo and eLevate are last season’s 1st and 2nd places, respectively, we should expect a close match…
Except that eLevate have been looking weak this season. Although they’ve done a good job against weaker teams, they’ve had trouble matching up to their fellow LAN teams, splitting with Street Hoops, losing to Mad Men twice and Froyo in their first match. eLevate have experimented with switching pocket and roamer, two roamers, a pyro and roamer, you name it. And it’s made for some great, entertaining TF2, but I just don’t believe that Alfa and Ma3la will be a match for Blaze and Lansky, and that will prove to be very important on a soldier-centric map like Granary. On the flip side, Bdonski will put out big damage as usual and I do think that Shrugger and Decimate are a very close match for B4nny and Clockwork. So look for a few typically quick Granary rounds from eLevate, but Froyo to win in the end. I think the curse of the 5-2 will continue.
Prediction: 5-2, Froyotech
Editor's Note
We're probably gonna leave out Week 9 (Snakewater week redux) in favor of planning ahead for LAN Preview. I'm still debating on if I want a giant article like last season or separate ones for each team. Should be extravagant either way.