Sonic is lashing out tournament after tournament. I was hoping for an off season with event matches so we could catch up with power ranking and what not, I miss the King of the Hills, the team battles. Although there is much to rejoice about. Mind, s2, and Pure all make their SOSPA debut. The scene is getting so many new ex-progamers and it's great. Mind even made it to the next round!

With the short notice and a surprise illness made me miss the deadline for group A unfortunately. But now we are back for more writing! This week starts off with the recap of last seasons finals by me and some much needed help from kerpal, read the recaps here. The preview of the three remaining groups finishes the article. Hope you aren't too disappointed with group A missing! The round of 16 continues in !

AppleSauce speaks the truth. Shuttle sometimes have immaculate play. Most often than not Shuttle looks like he dominates his opponent, and proceeds to play with his victim. Sometimes however; he plays so bad. Previously having the best PvT in the scene it's hard to imagine that he would lose to HiyA in their last six games, and it wasn't even close. It was an outright stomp, Shuttle looked clueless and died to everything. Having BisuDagger's blessing is turning out to be really bad. In other news I probably lost the liquibet season due to this bet.






If you are one of the people who does not watch SRT finals between Killer and Sea, then there might be little I can do to help you. Mostly this recap will serve as a reminder to you of how tense and dramatic this rivalry has become.

After the previous SRT final, some naysayers were predicting short, underwhelming games, but game one set the record straight. Killer took the game on the Terran favoured Neo Electric Circuit in a stunning 30 minute battle that transitioned from a strong two hatch mutalisk opening into a back and forth slugfest of mech vs Zerg. Both players were on top of their game here, but it was Sea who after 30 minutes could finally have been said to have blinked first.



Afterwards we saw two games in which Sea proved just how hard a good Terran player is to beat. First a bunker rush that Killer thought he had already defended was reinvigorated by a late SCV reinforcement, winning Sea the second game, then in the third set Sea was able to block Killer's expansion with an engineering bay, delaying Killer's natural so far that Sea was able to bring marines to bear narrowly before Killer was able to complete his first sunken colonies.

The final game was another spectacle. Sea playing SK Terran on Benzene and Killer matching him at every turn. This time it was Sea who was victorious, leaving Killer with another second place to his name. Winning five golds and four in a row cements Sea's position as the best player in the world even further.

Holy shit, what an amazing group. All four are quarterfinals material and all of them have been in a semifinals or higher recently. Earlier I would have said Larva would get knocked out of this group easily. Earlier I would have said sSak would destroy this group. So much has changed recently in the middle of the pack. Larva managed to make it to the semifinals in the YPSL, he ended up facing HiyA in the consolation match; where he upset him 2-1, and I can't stress enough how much of an upset that is. sSak surprisingly got knocked out last season as early as in the round of 16, going 1-2 in his group losing to Lazy twice in very straight up games.

Shuttle has been playing the most amazing and the worst Brood War in his life recently. He keeps crushing the earlier rounds but as fast as he runs into an A ranked player he loses and gets knocked out of the tournament. Losing to HiyA in their last six games is really bad. Mong has been resurging to his old self. Last season he made it to the quarterfinals where he almost upset Killer going 2-3, taking him to the brink of defeat. The season before he made it all the way to the semifinals before losing to Sea 0-3.



One of the worst ZvT'ers wins against HiyA who is amazing in the match-up, the best TvP in the scene gets knocked out by Lazy who is sub 50% in the match-up, the best PvT in the scene gets knocked out two times by HiyA; who's TvP is highly dubious. What has the world come to? What we know is all upside down. Calling who will advance from the group is really hard. I'm taking my bets on the ones who were progamers for a longer time, experience always shines through in the end.

Shuttle and sSak to advance.




It's very unlucky for s2 and Pure who are both making their SOSPA debut to be placed in the same group as Killer and Movie. I'm sure they wait the same demise as what happened for Scan. s2 was never really that good, his only match-up he was decent in was ZvP, as most Zerg are; with a 65% win rate and wins against opponents like Kal and Stork. Incidentally he is 2-0 against Pure, 1-0 against Movie, and 3-0 against Killer. Times have changed though. By looking at Pure's stats he was never a good player either. What he had was incredible stints of success in 2009 EVER OSL he made it to the quarterfinals, getting knocked out 0-2 by Calm but he knocked out players like Fake YellOw, Hwasin, and Leta on the way. His best result came in the 2010 Korean Air Starleague where he made it to the semifinals before getting knocked out by Flash 0-3. Once again he knocked out great players including Movie, Fantasy, and Calm. Pure was 3-1 against Movie and never played against Killer.



It's very safe to say that both of them will lose to Movie and Killer in this day and age. There is nothing that suggests that two "newcomers" will be able to advance from this group. s2 will beat Pure because of the Zerg over Protoss rule. Look forward to a really good PvZ between Movie and Killer, it's sure to be really close. Movie is the only other Protoss that can stand up against Killer and hero's amazing ZvP.

Killer and Movie to advance.




Another group of amazing players. Unfortunately it's quite predictable what's going to happen. hero doesn't have a chance in ZvT against either Sea or HiyA. Sea is too amazing to lose to Lazy and HiyA has been crushing in TvP lately. hero will destroy Lazy too. The only thing that can go either way is the best of one winners' match between Sea and HiyA. Lately they have been facing each other a lot. Last season they played in the winners' match of their round of 16 group, HiyA took that one, they later faced in the semifinals where Sea destroyed HiyA 3-0. The season before that they faced in the quarterfinals where Sea won again but in a very close series 3-2. They both have the ability to beat each other. In any case all the players in this group are all really good and should provide entertaining games.



Sea and HiyA to advance.